colchicum byzantinum & friends
Jane McGary (Tue, 06 Oct 2009 09:52:47 PDT)

John Flintoff wrote,

I think the Swedish botanist's name is spelled Karin Persson. She has
named a great many new species, mostly from Greece and the Balkans,
in recent years, which in my opinion will not help to clear up the
confusion. I heard from someone that her monograph is complete but
there is some hold-up with publishing it; I don't know whether it's
lack of funding or something else (from editorial experience I tend
to suspect a botanical artist is not finishing the drawings).

The two collections of Colchicum decaisnei that I have here are
similar in size but one does have wider tepals than the other. One is
from cultivated seed from the UK (but is definitely not C. laetum
hort.) and the other is a wild collection.

Incidentally, for many years I've been growing a miniature
white-flowered colchicum received from an English source as C.
cupanii, but I'm pretty sure it's C. hungaricum. However, in the new
entries for the NARGS photo contest there is a photo, taken in the
wild, and identified as C. hungaricum, that is rather different from
anything I have under that name. It may be an unusual form, however,
because it is white with a pink base. One of the prettiest small
colchicums here I bought from Antoine Hoog, a very reliable
botanist-grower, as C. hungaricum 'Valentine', and it is bright pink
and bigger than other C. hungaricum I've seen.

There are some very tiny Colchicum species, and these tend to
increase well. Increase in species also seems to vary with
individuals (or populations); for instance, I have three collections
of C. variegatum, and one of them increases fairly fast, but the
others hardly at all. Some species seem to set seed more readily than
others, but it's hard to collect the seed because it is apparently
attractive to ants, which usually find it before I do. Oddly, the
species formerly known as Merendera hang onto their seeds better;
perhaps the ant-attractant is not present on them?

Jane McGary
Northwestern Oregon, USA