>What it suggests to me is what in the old days were known as ?primulinus >hybrids? I am no expert on Gladiolus classification so would be interested to hear other's opinions as I am looking into a query regarding them myself. However, the RHS Plant Finder does recognise Primulinus hybrids as something distinctly different from the Nanus. It classifies Gladiolus under the following headings: (B) Butterfly (E) Exotic (G) Giant (L) Large (M) Medium (Min) Miniature (N) Nanus (P) Primulinus (S) Small (Tub) Tubergenii It must be noted that this is entirely its own classification and is not adopted by others as far as I know. In contrast, the International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants only recognises two denomination classes for Gladiolus - namely "large-flowering types" and "species and early-flowering types". (A denomination class is a group of plants within which the cultivar name cannot be repeated - it is normally the whole genus but in a few cases such as Gladiolus, it is subdivided so that you can have the same cultivar name in Gladiolus as long as it belongs to a different denomination class.) What I am not clear on is to which denomination class the Primulinus types belong to, especially as they do not appear to be mutually exclusive. Primulinus hybrids are presumably not large-flowering types but are they early-flowering enough to belong to the other class? Chris