My comments on some of these questions follow. I've been growing colchicums for over 20 years, mostly the robust hybrids and commercial clones of the species, but they are a very confusing bunch, complicated by rampant misnaming in the trade and confusion in the literature. Many so-called species in cultivation are clones of hybrid or uncertain origin: C. agrippinum (hybrid), C. atropurpureum (dubious provenance), C. byzantinum (hybrid), C. pannonicum (dubious provenance) and C. tenorii (dubious provenance) immediately spring to mind. As with most bulbs, it is the rapidly multiplying clones that have made it into wider cultivation. My knowledge of the smaller species is poor. Botanically they are very awkward brutes to deal with, in most cases flowering long before the leaves so the collector visiting Greece in autumn may collect the flowers but not the leaves - and vice versa in spring. This somewhat explains the synonymy of C. bivonae (C. sibthorpii, C. bowlesianum), for example. Not to mention the problems involved in extracting, then pressing a corm: and one needs to see the whole shoot, not just detached flowers, to see how it fits together. Only by cultivating carefully documented material can one ever hope to see and record the entire growth cycle. The monograph by Karin Persson from Sweden is mentioned occasionally, but never seems to get beyond that stage, alas. > 3. Colchicum major I can't find, but I can find Colchicum autumnale > 'Major'. Is there a species major or is this a cultivar of another species > and should be moved? > ANSWER: I haven't seen this as a valid name anywhere. The pictured plant > could be C. autumnale, which is described as "occasionally tessellated." Anyone else know of a C. major or think that Arnold's picture is of > Colchicum autumnale 'Major'? C. autumnale 'Major', as Jim McKenney has mentioned, is a trade name for C. byzantinum, and the plant illustrated is the typical broad-segmented clone of that ancient hybrid, sent from Constantinople to Vienna in 1588. The crooked purple styles are the giveaway feature. The plant labelled on the wiki as C. byzantinum is not correct, but insufficient detail is visible to enable an identification. There is another clone that fits the general description of C. byzantinum but has much narrower segments: it is in the trade as C. laetum (but that is really a different species, obtainable from Janis Ruksans in Latvia and correctly illustrated on the wiki). > > > 4. Colchicum pannonicum has a note written next to it by Jim McKenney I > suspect saying that this plant is now regarded as a clonal selection of C. > autumnale and has the cultivar name 'Nancy Lindsay'. Should we change it or > is that note sufficient? > > ANSWER: I would leave the note, because apparently there are several of > these purple-tubed C. autumnale forms around, and I'm told the form is > common in the wild in certain areas. Probably not all such plants are the > clone 'Nancy Lindsay', though many of them probably are. From Arnold: "C. pannonicum named for Pannonia which is an ancient name > for what is now part Hungary. Mathew say in his Bulb Newsletter that it is > "so similar that they could be part of the same clone as 'Nancy Lindsay'. > He also says it is a 'plant very much like C. autumnale' Chris Brickell, > in his account of Colchicum for Flora Europaea, decided to sink the species > into C. autumanale. > > Mathew says " So, unless new field studies of the colchicums in this area > indicate otherwise, the situation is that the excellent plant which is > being distributed as C. pannonicum appears to be a very nice color variant > of the very widespread C. autumnale." A very difficult question. 'Nancy Lindsay' is to my mind one of the best Colchicums, being vigorous and easy to grow, producing masses of shapely and proportionate flowers that are richly coloured. Its origins are very unclear: Nancy Lindsay was a great gardener (anything with her name attached is a GOOD plant!) but many of her provenances do not ring true. She became a hard-up nurserywoman and was prone to exaggerate plants' charms and merits; it is tempting to think she enhanced their origins as well. A stock of Galanthus elwesii and the wonderful Arum italicum 'Nancy Lindsay' were both said to have come from her 1930s motoring trip around 'Persia', but neither grows there! Her colchicum is clearly an excellent clone of C. autumnale, but I would be tempted to avoid the question and call it, perfectly legitimately , Colchicum 'Nancy Lindsay'. > > > > 5. Colchicum sibthorpii my sources say should be C. bivonae. Would you look > at Arnold's pictures and let me know if they need to be renamed. Seems to be OK, but I have bought the tessellated hybrid 'Autumn Queen' in the past as C. sibthorpii and the 'error' could recur. John Grimshaw