Early-flowering Fritillaria species and their hardiness
Jane McGary (Thu, 06 Mar 2014 13:01:22 PST)

A walk through the bulb house this morning was enlivened by the first
opening flowers of a number of Fritillaria species. Most of them are
on the "dry" side, plants from semi-arid Asian and eastern
Mediterranean regions. They include the following:
Fritillaria raddeana
Fritillaria zagrica
Fritillaria eduardii
Fritillaria bucharica
Fritillaria obliqua
Fritillaria gibbosa
Fritillaria stenanthera (three forms)
Fritillaria striata
Fritillaria chitralensis
Fritillaria arriana
Fritillaria euboica
Fritillaria serpentinicola
Fritillaria sewertzowii
Fritillaria latifolia
Fritillaria caucasica

Well represented is the section named for the familiar Fritillaria
imperialis (not in flower here yet): raddeana, eduardii, and
chitralensis. The Rhinopetalum section also tends to be early, with
gibbosa, arriana, stenanthera, and bucharica. F. euboica and F.
serpentinicola are Greek species sometimes included in Fritillaria
carica, which is just in bud here. The earliest American species as
always is F. striata from the mountains of southern California. I
grew all these plants from seed, beginning with F. raddeana in 1988
(the original bulbs are still flowering, along with their seedlings).

We have had two spells of severe frost lasting about a week each, one
in early December and one in early February when some of these plants
had emerging foliage; F. striata had leaves up during the December
freeze, when the temperature dropped one night to 17 F here. F.
obliqua, native to the area of Athens, was in bud during the February
freeze down to 20 F, and showed no damage. This shows that the
literature claiming some species to be particularly tender should
probably be looked at critically. My plants went through temperatures
down to 20 F (minus 6 C) regularly at my former home, where I had
them in unheated cold frames. The present bulb house is unheated and
covered only with a transparent roof; the sides are wire mesh. The
bulbs are in raised beds of very well drained soil.

Jane McGary
Portland, Oregon, USA