From the category archives:

Colchicums

Colchicums: Garden Bloggers Bloom Day October 2009

October 15, 2009

You might think after a 26F freeze there would be nothing left blooming in the garden, but you would be wrong. The colchicums continue to shoot up new blossoms. Pictured above is Colchicum autumnale ‘Album’.Early on in my colchicum acquisitions, I discovered three different varieties that, to my eye, were indistinguishable. It turns out a [...]

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Colchicum Design Ideas from Montrose Gardens

October 10, 2009

Many gardeners complain that it is difficult to place colchicums in the garden because of their unusual growing cycle, in which their leaves grow in the spring, die down in the summer, and then the flowers emerge in the fall. The colchicum bed at Montrose Gardens in Hillsborough, North Carolina, pictured above, contained many colchicum [...]

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First colchicum

September 6, 2009

My first colchicum is up but hasn’t pinked up yet.Most colchicums emerge white and then pink up over the next few days.
Did you know I am a colchicum evangelist, spreading the good news of colchicums wherever I go? For some of my earlier messages, check out the archives.

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Garden Bloggers Bloom Day June 2008

June 15, 2008

Poppies, peonies, and iris: the three Grandes Dames of June
In a cold climate, the gardening season is shorter and more compressed. By the time the spring flowers get going, boom! it’s summer. Consider this: on May 29th we had our last frost. The next day it hit 80F (27C), which we reckon to be summery, [...]

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Frost Damage–or Disease?

May 6, 2008

These plants don’t look too happy, but I’m not sure if it’s the cold that put them in a snit, or a viral infection. Left to right: Daylily 2E, Colchicum giganteum, Daylily 4B, C. ‘Harlequin,’ Daylily 4C, C. speciousum

After nearly two weeks of warm, frost-free weather in April, my garden got socked with a 22 [...]

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Colchicums are beginning to emerge

September 5, 2007

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Hello, Winter; Good-bye, Autumn

November 5, 2006

This is what greeted my eyes Friday (Nov. 3) morning: the first snow this season that remained on the ground instead of melting on contact. After the freak snowstorms in Buffalo and elsewhere, it’s rather yawn-inspiring, I know, but it does help one turn one’s face like flint toward the coming storms. No more remaining [...]

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Kathy’s Autumn Picture Show

October 21, 2006

Sunday, October 8th, was a gorgeous autumn day, sunny and warm. I decided to go up the hill for a walk in the woods, camera in hand, and you get to share the results. (Be forewarned: this is an even longer than usual post.) But first, a little bit about where we’re going. Our family [...]

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Pretty in Pink?

October 11, 2006

This is a section of the Birthday Garden, which is a somewhat raised bed sandwiched between the driveway and the house. At the base of the stone wall, looking rather pale, are some Colchicum byzantinum. Above them is an unknown chrysanthemum, which Debi Lampman of Bedlam Gardens in King Ferry, NY gave to me this [...]

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Curiouser and curiouser

October 1, 2006

As befits a good garden buddy, I gave some colchicum bulbs to my friend Bub several years ago. As a matter of fact, every time I dig up and divide a new kind, I give her some, so by now she has at least three kinds. But she’s never bought any herself, so all that [...]

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Will the real colchicums please stand up?

September 26, 2006

When I was growing up, there was a game show on tv called “To Tell the Truth.” The various contestants tried to trick the game show panelists into thinking they were the true zoo veterinarian or whatever weird occupation was featured that day.
Sometimes I think my colchicums are trying the same trick on me. Oh, [...]

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My miracle flower

September 19, 2006

Colchicums as a whole are pretty miraculous, emerging from out of nowhere and blooming without leaves, but this particular variety (Colchicum agrippinum) takes the cake. I planted it in autumn of 2004. It didn’t bloom then, and it failed to send up leaves in 2005. Not surprisingly, it didn’t bloom in 2005, either. When [...]

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They’re coming! They’re coming!

September 1, 2006

No, it’s not the Invasion of the Subterranean Aliens. These are emerging colchicum flowers. Col-chi-what? An underused flowering bulb from the Lily family, which hold a fascination for me that I really can’t explain. I never would have discovered them, had they not been growing here when we moved in. Their botanical weirdness of blooming [...]

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