Leucojum JCA 630.480
Jane McGary (Sat, 27 Mar 2004 17:23:16 PST)
John Grimshaw wrote,
This plant [Leucojum tingitanum] is now correctly known as Acis
tingitana, to follow the very
sensible suggestion from botanists at Kew that all the small Leucojums with
narrow leaves and unmarked flowers revert to the old genus Acis, reserving
Leucojum for the robust, wide-leaved, green-marked L. aestivum and L.
vernum. That nobody has questioned this extraordinary lumping (inb the
1880s, by J.G. Baker) in the past is really quite remarkable.
Exactly what is now in Acis? Everything except the two Leucojum species
with green markings?
The plants I am growing as L. tingitanum (seed from Michael Salmon), from
which I distributed a few bulbs last summer, flower in late winter. They
have glaucous leaves with a pronounced keel, about 7 mm wide (the leaf, not
the keel), and flower stems to 25 cm tall. My reference says L. fontianum
is "similar to L. nicaeense, but leaves 6-8 mm wide with flowers in April"
and flower stems to 12 cm tall. L. nicaeense has very narrow dark green
leaves that tend to lie low to the ground, and is in bud now; and L.
trichophyllum has threadlike dark leaves. There is also a pretty
fall-blooming all-white species, L. valentinum. All of these increase quite
fast in my bulb frames, but I haven't succeeded with them in the open
garden yet.
Jane McGary
Northwestern Oregon, USA