Fritillaria 2010

[Gerry Webster]

I agree - it looks like 'Martha Roderick'.

[Diane Clement]

hmmm! .........plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose     ( in many ways!!  

not thinking of politics, by any chance, Maggi, were you?   

[Maggi Young]

Truly I was thinking of we poor confused gardeners and the added trials of taxonomy for our addled brains.... but since you mention it............


 By the way... Frit. biflora  in general and 'Martha Roderick' in particular, is one of the most stinking yucky smelling frits ever ..... I strongly advise against ever travelling in a car with one in flower..... truly revolting pong!

[Lesley Cox]

OK so I'd better bow out, obviously making the confusion worse than ever. My original biflora 'Martha Roderick' and grayana (as grayana) were sent to me by Wayne Roderick himself and were different, the grayana being very distict with the creamy-white patches. MR was more brown and green.

If the pics in the link you gave Maggi, were purdyi, what is this then, from Ratko seed as purdyi.

[Maggi Young]

Did I give a link to purdyi? Can't recall!
edit: Oh, yes, i see... in the previous page to the one linked.... from Wolfgang.... yesm, I see what you mean. Those are darker with a more defined central stripe but still....

Your pic does look like F. purdyi, Lesley. There are paler and darker forms.... plenty variability in this as in so many others!

[Lesley Cox]

No it was the link to the Martha Rodericks I think but Gerry W or someone said they could be purdyi, agreeing with someone else. Or maybe I'm just totally confused. It's only 11am too.

[Maggi Young]

Here  there are  purdyi that were labelled Martha Roderick.....
http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=2987.msg91988#msg91988

then, here : http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=2987.345 Mike Ireland had 'Martha Roderick' that are, only they were initially c labelled affinis not biflora..... 
there's a fair amount of scope for confusion here, for sure!

[Lesley Cox]

Oh yes, now I get it. I have a bucket ready to put my head in.

[Oakwood]

The last frits bloom at me this year

F. meleagroides - meadows along river Severskiy Donets, SE Ukraine
F. olgae - C. Asia

[Pete Clarke]

Thanks everyone for your expert identification of my Frit.
Ashley - her is a picture of the foliage & flower. Height = 7-8 inches.
Maggie - I havn't detected any smell from it.

Pete.

[ashley]

Thanks Pete.  Mine could be the same; time will tell    

[olegKon]

Fritillaria messanensis gracilis is exaptionnally robust this year

[olegKon]

Can anyone help identify this Fritillaria. Is it a pontica?

[Gerry Webster]

Oleg -  since it is faintly tessellated I would be inclined to say  F. thessala. You can distinguish F. pontica from F. thessala by the seed capsule. That of the former is winged & that of the latter is unwinged.

[Wim de Goede]

The story of Fritillaria biflora Martha Roderick

When I visited Wayne Roderick in 1985 we tolked about Frit roderickii, where the habitat was and the time of flowering, it was then begin of April and that was not the ride time to see it in flower, so before I went home Wayne gave mea small pot with one bulb in it and told me that that was the real Frit. roderickii and that it was not growing very well on his place.
So when I came home we put it in Tissue culture and the next year we got 100 bulbs to tray out, year later we got 5000 bulbs from the laberatorium and year later a other 10000 bulbs, we grew that on for a couple of years with succes.
I think it was in 1991 or 1992 when I went to the AGS conference in Birmingham and I brought 10 pots with Frit. roderickii for the auction, it was then that Wayne told us that it was not Frit. roderickii anymor because Roger Macfarlane had find out that it was a form of Frit. biflora.
Wayne was not agree with it and also the judge committy did not, so they dicided at that moment that the Frit. I gave for the auction was not Frit. roderickii but Frit. biflora Martha Roderick after the mother of Wayne.
S you can say a succes story, we have never havea succes with Fritillarias in Tissue culture.
Anyway. the stok of Frit. biflora Martha Roderick does not exist anymore, when I quit with the Firm and started Kwekerij De Schullhorn in 2000 they sold the stok to a other nursery and they lost the hole stok.
So it would be intresting to find some bulbs for building up a new stok

Wim