Tulipa 2015

[johnralphcarpenter]

Cold and grey today, but a few flowers: Tulipa fulgens just appearing, Tulipa vvedenskyi fully open, Tulipa sosnowskyi.

[Matt T]

Wonderful tulips, Ralph. Those colours just zing!

[johnralphcarpenter]

Yes, even on a dull day.

[johnralphcarpenter]

Some very welcome rain this morning. A few more in flower: Tulipa maximowiczii, from Peter Korn; Tulipa butkowii; Tulipa carinata still looking good; Tulipa urumiensis.

[johnralphcarpenter]

Tulipa karabachensis, Tulipa armena, another Tulipa montana var. chrysantha, and the dubious Tulipa albertii now fully open.

[Hoy]

I grow my tulips outside. Here is Tulipa saxatilis which have been at the same spot for many years.

[fixpix]

Lovely tulips!
I also have some scattered around, not sure any have names but here I go

[johnralphcarpenter]

Not a brilliant year for species Tulips weatherwise. Mostly over now but this Tulipa butkowii still looking good.

[Yann]

Anyway, nice collection Ralph. This year lot's of tulips had suffered from the hot and dry spring.

[Corrado & Rina]

By the way, what do you do when your tulipa have flowered and gone to seeds? do you leave them in the pot, or do you cut back vegetation and take them out of the pot?

Regards

Corrado

[johnralphcarpenter]

I leave them in the pots, covered by a plastic tunnel, to dry out and bake (I put bags over the seed heads to collect seed). I try to repot in late summer every second year, i.e. half the collection one year, the rest the next. I keep them covered and bone dry until February, when I remove the covers and hope for snow!

[Corrado & Rina]

I leave them in the pots, covered by a plastic tunnel, to dry out and bake (I put bags over the seed heads to collect seed). I try to repot in late summer every second year, i.e. half the collection one year, the rest the next. I keep them covered and bone dry until February, when I remove the covers and hope for snow!

Thanks John! You have quite an amazing collection .... what compost do you use? and .... where do you buy them? Some of the species you have I have never heard ....

Best,

Corrado

[johnralphcarpenter]

50/50 john Innes no 2 and sharp grit. I have  lot from Janis, some from Kurt Vickery. There are other suppliers (Kevock, Paul Christian, Broadleigh, etc etc.) but it is a lottery as to whether what you get is correctly described. There are a lot of so-called specie tulips in commerce from Dutch suppliers which may have been attributable to wild species once but have been in cultivation for so long that they are best described as Genus Species Hort. I also have got some from other collectors in Europe, and seeds from Kurt and Oron Peri. As to species description, the taxonomy of Tulipa is in a bit of a mess, as the recent Kew Monograph amply demonstrates. What is a species, subspecies, variety or synonym is open to debate.

[FrazerHenderson]

T.tetraphyll - habitat

[Maggi Young]

Great habitat shot, Frazer.