Tom asked, >Does anyone know of a reference work on Colchicum more recent (and >better illustrated) than E.A. Bowles' book form the fifties? I'd love >to try and identify what I've got... A Swedish botanist, Karen Persson, has written a new monograph of the genus, but it has not yet appeared. I have heard that they are having trouble getting funding for the publication. Persson has named many new taxa over the past few years. The write-up I mentioned in the AGS Encyclopaedia of Alpines is by Chris Brickell, who was also at one time said to be preparing a monograph, but apparently this did not come to fruition. In any case, a botanical monograph would not be helpful in identifying cultivars, many of which are hybrids. Besides, many of the named varieties appear almost identical except for very slight differences in flower size, amount of white in the throat, presence of tessellation, or depth of pink color. You can identify the most distinctive ones, such as C. x agrippinum or C. speciosum 'Album', from photos. I do have a Dutch descriptive list, prepared by Antoine Hoog, that describes a number of large cultivars and could photocopy the relevant pages for Tom if he gives me his postal address. Jane McGary Northwestern Oregon, USA