Colchicums: In person and in scans
Colchicums are fast becoming one of my favorite flower bulbs. Like most bulbs, they push up their foliage in spring and then die back. But they hold off on flowering until fall — just when the garden could use a little jolt of color.
The variety below, ‘Waterlily’ isn’t typical featuring extra petals.
Here’s a scan I did of several different colchicums growing in my garden. The white one is ‘Alboplenum’, which also features the extra petals like ‘Waterlily’. The other three are from a ‘pass-along plant’ that a gardening friend gave me, and resemble large crocuses.
Here’s what ‘Alboplenum’ looks like in the garden, providing some fall foraging for a hungry honeybee:
Here’s another at a friend’s garden that has a checkerboard pattern on it’s petals:
Colchicums are as easy to grow as other bulbs, and spread if they’re happy where you plant them. You only need to be careful not to weed them out by accident in spring.
As a plus, deer and other critters won’t eat them because they contain toxic colchicine, sometimes used as an anti-gout drug. But for that reason, you need to be careful not to plant them where there’s a risk that small children might ingest them.
Submitted on: October 25, 2009
By: Craig Cramer
Topics: Activities, How to grow |
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:26 am
Good to know that Colchicums are fast becoming one of my favorite flower bulbs. Actually i like flowers and feels good to read about them. Last week i purchase fresh flowers and gift it to my mom. I made visit to site flower-shops.biz and find flower shop near my area. This is really helpful site for knowing flower shop in Canada and helps us in sending flowers locally and internationally.