List of early-flowering snowdrops

[MR GRUMPY]

I have 'Mary Biddulph' just about to flower. That doesn't seem to be on the list? Is this unusually early?

I've grown 'Mary Biddulph'for a few years now.Here are my flowering dates,(08/02/08),(23/01/09),(12/02/10),(28/01/11),(06/01/12),(02/02/13),(05/01/14).I wouldn't call it early.

 Hope that is some use for your list?,Alan.

[pehe]

It is a very useful list, thank you for your work Allan!
But for me it will be even more useful if it could be sorted according to flowering time and not alphabetical.
This is maybe too difficult, and I will be glad if you could mention the 3 earliest flowering.

Peter Gatehouse have been flowering here for some weeks, Barnes is in bud and and flower buds are just visible in Three Ships.

Poul

[johnstephen29]

Hi Hoy I have some Reginae Olgae which are still in flower & have a few seed cases on them, if I can get them to ripen I'll send you some.

[mark smyth]

But for me it will be even more useful if it could be sorted according to flowering time and not alphabetical.
This is maybe too difficult, and I will be glad if you could mention the 3 earliest flowering.

Peter Gatehouse have been flowering here for some weeks, Barnes is in bud and and flower buds are just visible in Three Ships.

I think this would be very difficult and my guess is flowering varies between gardens. My Three Ships is just coming through as are my Peter Gatehouse. My Barnes are over.

[Hoy]

Hi Hoy I have some Reginae Olgae which are still in flower & have a few seed cases on them, if I can get them to ripen I'll send you some.

John, that's very kind of you. I appreciate that very much!

[Maggi Young]

Some other suggestions to discover which 'drops are flowering early -

1)   make a search of some of the cultivar names mentioned already here  ( from the "Search" Button, fourth from the left in the set of options  towards the top of the page)- and opting to search only in the Galanthus thread.

2)  make a search -( or just look through the forum section  for Galanthus) for the Galanthus threads from, says, October in any given year and you'll find the ones which recur.

[johnstephen29]

No problem Hoy happy to share.

[kentish_lass]

An interesting thread Alan - thanks for starting it.  I had my first ever success with reginae olgae in the ground (last year no flower this year three flowers).   I was very happy.

Then i had Remember Remember and now Tilebarn Jamie, Hollis about to flower what i believe to be Frinton Advent.

The reason i say 'believe to be' is because a creature of the night pulled 20 pots from my cold frame a few weeks ago.  There were chewed pots, labels, soil and bulbs everywhere    I gathered everything up and repotted keeping the muddled labels to hopefully identify.  No bulbs appear to have been eaten so i am just guessing it may have been the bonemeal in my mix that attracted them.   Any ideas anyone?

Will take a photo of "Frinton Advent" tomorrow as it is flower now.

[Alan_b]

Hi Jennie, nice to hear from you.  I've added 'Frinton Advent' to the list, although the only references I could find to it were your post in 2013 and the sales list here http://www.snowdropman.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Andrews-snowdrops-Jan2014.pdf.  If it flowers at Xmas then it just makes the end of the list.

Since I only own a very few of these snowdrops myself, it is difficult to rank them in flowering order.  I do now have 'Peter Gatehouse' in several spots in my garden and this year the flowering time varied by several weeks from one position to another.  I also have two bulbs of 'Remember Remember' in the same pot.  One flowered and finished about two weeks ago whilst the other is still in bud!  Steve's superbly well-documented flowering times for 'Mary Biddulph' caused me to reject that suggestion - but keep them coming please.

[Brian Ellis]

Since I only own a very few of these snowdrops myself, it is difficult to rank them in flowering order.  I do now have 'Peter Gatehouse' in several spots in my garden and this year the flowering time varied by several weeks from one position to another.  I also have two bulbs of 'Remember Remember' in the same pot.  One flowered and finished about two weeks ago whilst the other is still in bud! 

...and that hits the problem smack on.  Since I moved my 'Barnes' from a cold spot in the front garden to a warm spot in the back garden it has flowered at the same time as everyone else.  This made weeks of difference in flowering time so it very much depends on soil and situation I think.

[Tim Harberd]

Hi Alan,
   The best solution to smoothing out variations in different garden environments is to adopt the Peony Bloom Time Project’s model

http://peonybloomdate.com/description.htm


   Where cultivars are ranked in days, before or behind, a commonly grown standard cultivar. Mind you, collating that sort of data is a huge amount of work for '''someone''' to volunteer to do!

   In the case of early snowdrops.. If everyone reported how many days in front or behind ‘Three Ships’ their other cultivars flowered. Then an average difference for each cultivar could be produced.. And from that, a chronological list!

Tim DH

[Alan_b]

Added 'Else Grollenberg'
http://www.srgc.net/forum/index.php?topic=6017.msg174543#msg174543
Available here: http://www.sneeuwklokjes.nl/

[art600]

I have Galanthus 'Spring Greens' in bud.

Cannot find any details of this snowdrop, but the name seems odd for one flowering early winter.

[ruben]

For me in Belgium Galanthus elwesii 'Donald Simm's early' (zie snowdrops book) and Galanthus plicatus 'colossus' are always bloom before new year.

[Alan_b]

I have Galanthus 'Spring Greens' in bud.

It's in 'The Book'.  It's one of Primrose Warburg's and the name alludes to the fact that the leaves are very well-developed at the early time of flowering.  But I don't think it is early enough to make the list, if 'January' is accurate.

Similarly, Ruben, I think 'Colossus' is slightly later than 'Three Ships' so just misses my arbitrary cut-off.  I don't know about 'Donald Simm's Early' - can anyone else vouch for it?  I might make an additional list of 'near-misses' anyway.

Later edit: The snowdrop in question turned out to be 'Donald Sims' Early' and made the list