Galanthus February 2008

[Martin Baxendale]

I notice that he claims to sell Galanthus platyphyllus, but is it?

I ordered a bulb of platyphyllus from him year before last, hoping to do some hybridising with it. The leaves that came up last year looked right for platyphyllus but no flower. No sign of it this year. It's supposed to be late, but probably not this late, so it may have gone to snowdrop heaven (maybe a casualty of the early die-back in last spring's hot weather and/or the wet summer). 

[Martin Baxendale]

Your Clare Blakeway-Phillips look good Mark - no signs of virus? Almost all of mine turned out to be virused and dwindled away (I think they had virus when I bought them, and it just got worse). I chipped my last healthy looking bulb last year to try to get it going again. It's a lovely snowdrop.

Your sandersii are doing well too - are you on acid soil?

[mark smyth]

acid grit!

Clare is badly virused the inner mark is badly streaked

[Maggi Young]

Poor Clare, are you going to do away with her? Chip to see if it removes the virus?

[Anthony Darby]

Sandersii does well with me.

[mark smyth]

Someone called Mark Smyth is giving two lectures in Suffolk next February - 2nd and 3rd

[snowdropman]

I notice that he claims to sell Galanthus platyphyllus, but is it?

I ordered a bulb of platyphyllus from him year before last, hoping to do some hybridising with it. The leaves that came up last year looked right for platyphyllus but no flower. No sign of it this year. It's supposed to be late, but probably not this late, so it may have gone to snowdrop heaven (maybe a casualty of the early die-back in last spring's hot weather and/or the wet summer). 

Martin - I too bought mine from PC the year before last and, like you, it just produced leaves in the first year - by a stroke of good fortune I had to dig mine up in November and discovered that they had stagno - after peeling back the infected scales/cutting out the infected part of the growing tip, soaking in a carbendazim based fungicide and potting up in sharp sand, I am hopeful that I have managed to save at least 2 of my bulbs and strong leaf growth is now evident (the 3rd bulb is again showing signs of stagno on the tip of its leaf & I am going to try repeating the treatment). You have nothing to lose by digging yours up and seeing if anything can be saved!

[ian mcenery]

Martin here is a close up of the said Mighty Atom showing the 2 white marks. Some of the flowers have a bleeding green affect which varies from flower to flower.

I have read the the Alan Leslie article which attempts to classify and seperate these but who knows now which is the real McCoy and I understand the story is that EB Anderson who found this snowdrop probably gave away seedlings as well as the original hence the extended family. 

[Martin Baxendale]

Martin here is a close up of the said Mighty Atom showing the 2 white marks. Some of the flowers have a bleeding green affect which varies from flower to flower.

I have read the the Alan Leslie article which attempts to classify and seperate these but who knows now which is the real McCoy and I understand the story is that EB Anderson who found this snowdrop probably gave away seedlings as well as the original hence the extended family. 

Indeed he did! In fact he gave one to my father as Mighty Atom which no-one else has, as well as various others like Imbolc, which he gave to Primrose Warburg as Atom. There must have been unflowered seedlings in the original clump he got from John Gray's garden, which he thought were offsets from Atom and gave away as such.

Mighty Atom's mark shouldn't really bleed upwards a lot, but you can sometimes get a little bleeding (as you can with any snowdrop mark) so I'm not sure it's an absolutely hard and fast rule. I think if you got it 30 years ago as Atom, when Little Ben wasn't even (as far as I'm aware) around or being sold by anyone, or even been identified, then it's much more likely to be Atom than Little Ben.

[Martin Baxendale]

I meant to say, the pic I posted is of what is said to be the 'accepted' clone - the one that the experts say was what E.B. Anderson originally distributed as Atom. Anything with a mark that bleeds a lot up the segment is definitely not true Atom. If the bleeding is only slight and only on some flowers, not on others, then it's probably not important enough to worry about.

[Martin Baxendale]

Mark, sorry to hear your Clare B-P are also virused, but I think I read that virtually all stock is virused. Shame; it's a very nice snowdrop.

Chris, I think I will get my platyphyllus up and see what's going on and if I can rescue it. Thanks.

[snowdropman]

Here are some snowdrops from the garden today ........Deeley Boppers........

Mark - can you give us some more information about g. 'Deeley Boppers' e.g. who bred/named it, when discovered etc?

[mark smyth]

I forgot to say that this has come up next to Alison Hilary. All three inners are the same. It's also much taller than Alison. I'll measure the height in a while

[snowdropman]

Mark, sorry to hear your Clare B-P are also virused, but I think I read that virtually all stock is virused. Shame; it's a very nice snowdrop.

Yes, this form is virused so, unless it can be grown in isolation from other snowdrops, one to be given a miss.

[mark smyth]

The plant beside Alison Hilary is 10 inches while Alison Hilary is just over 7 inches. The book says it should be 7 inches.