About 10 years ago I started growing tulips from wild-collected seed. I
don't have horticultural tulips in the garden because I worry about
introducing viruses (which can also affect Lilium). More recently Kurt
Vickery has offered seeds of many Tulipa species through his late-summer
list. Many of them are beginning to mature and flower now. The
raised-bed side of the bulb house is very colorful with red tulips --
some very large -- and numerous bulbs of an old Archibald collection
from western Iran, which I think is Tulipa montana. The latter
multiplies fast and is a beautiful color. On the other side of the bulb
house, where I keep plunged pots, the curious Tulipa regelii has just
finished flowering (yes, hand-pollinated), and now I'm enjoying a lovely
pink one, received as Tulipa rosea. Pink is not a common color in wild
tulips, and this one is an example of the annoying disconnect between
author and editors in Diana Everett's "The genus Tulipa: Tulips of the
world" (Kew 2013). Everett keeps the name T. rosea, but the assiduous
lumpers at Kew put it with T. korolkowii and it is tucked into the
section with the latter as running head. My three seedlings are
identical in color and form, and have very narrow, glaucous leaves with
strongly ruffled (crispate) margins. There's also a very tiny Tulipa
cretica in first flower, only about 7 cm tall, in contrast to my old
plants (Archibald seed) which are almost three times as tall in flower.
Probably the little one will be larger in subsequent years.
A couple of years ago I made an open raised bed especially to hold
mature, larger tulips. Three or four species are in there now, doing
well. One is Tulipa rhodopaea, one of the "Neotulips" that are believed
to be descended from garden introductions in the former Ottoman Empire.
It is deep rose-pink, on tall stems, and I assume came from the Rhodope
Mountains. I added some rocks and mat-forming little plants to extend
the season on this bed, some crocuses for early and fall bloom, and some
extra small Narcissus such as N. calcicola. Also trialing there are a
few aril hybrid irises ('Cythe' has done very well) and Juno irises,
growing in the background.
It can take quite a few years for tulips to flower from seed, but if you
have the space and patience, it's well worth it.
Jane McGary, Portland, Oregon, USA
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