New Crocus Year 2020

[Tomte]

Beautiful... all of them. And that style of C. Hartmannianus stands out like a lantern.

This one here is from Janis, too. Crocus sakaltutanensis. So lovely, but what a name. I always want to spell it differently 

It is a lovely dark blue on the outer segments and lighter blue on the inner ones. curiously, though, the new flower is much lighter (it was warmer the last days and I guess that did it).

[Janis Ruksans]

In this entry few very special crocuses. I start with seedling from Eugenius Dambrauskas named by him as Snow Tiger. Augis suppose that it is occasional hybrid between korolkowii and michelsonii grown up from open pollinated seeds of C. korolkowii.
Next is my collection of Crocus crewei 'Hot Chocolate'. The name was given by Ibrahim Sozen to the plant collected at the same locality and looking identical with mine later gathering, so I decided to keep the same name, although they are not clone originating from single plant.
And the last two pictures are from my most lovely crocus, and why it is so - explains the name - Crocus ruksansii - named by Dima Zubov. It is tiny crocus from Karpathos Island in Greece. I four times visited this island trying to find this crocus, but only once saw few plants long after blooming. Half of plants, collected by me, I sent to Erich Pasche, but later it was named by Dima, who found it on the same Island, following my advice - how to reach mountain top where it is growing wild. Earlier it was regarded as C. nubigena, but is very different from it and from other species from same series.

[Janis Ruksans]

Beautiful... all of them. And that style of C. Hartmannianus stands out like a lantern.

This one here is from Janis, too. Crocus sakaltutanensis. So lovely, but what a name. I always want to spell it differently 

It is a lovely dark blue on the outer segments and lighter blue on the inner ones. curiously, though, the new flower is much lighter (it was warmer the last days and I guess that did it).

It was named after Sakaltutan gecidi (mountain pass) where it was found. Crocus colour depends from temperature, but such difference surprise me, too.

[Maggi Young]

Crocus ruksanii was first  described in  International Rock Gardener (IRG) 90 of June 2017 -
    http://www.srgc.org.uk/logs/logdir/2017Jun211498039508IRG_90_June.pdf

[Janis Ruksans]

Some more from yesterday. At first few which looks very similar to Crocus iranicus but checking still not finished. Then two pictures of Crocus uschakensis, easy separable from other so named "chrysanthus"because it is without pleasant scent, easier to name its scent as pungent.

[Janis Ruksans]

Again some crocuses pictured last Tuesday. At first Iranian Crocus almehensis, then 2 hybrids - the first from wild, second grown up from seeds received from AGS as C. artvinensis. Then semi double (not permanent) C. concinnus and as last Crocus crewei.

[Tomte]

It is once again time for the fantastic turquoise Crocus baytopiorum. Not as compact as last year, but I had to shut it up under an glass wool blanket for the last few days due to the recent cold wave in Bavaria. Beautiful nonetheless, and also slowly bulking up..

[Mariette]

Yes, the blue species are fascinating!

Just a chance-seedling.

[Yann]

another corsican species : Crocus minimus

[Ophrys]

The Crocus flower in my greenhouse was quick this year and is nearly over. Crocus abantensis and Crocus heuffelianus Taavi are two of the last ones. Outdoor there are some Crocus species left and in the greenhouse the next will be the Fritillaria. I guess Fritillaria japonica will be the first.

[Yann]

yes crocuses don't last long in the greenhouse, it's too warm for an early spring.

Crocus seisumsiana from Janis, second wave of flowers

[Roma]

Two pots of crocuses grown from seed of Crocus sieberi 'Hubert Edelsten'.  The 07 one is close to the seed parent but the 09 one is more like sieberi ssp. sublimis 'Tricolor'  which could be the pollen parent.

07 on the left and 09 on the right.



07



09

[Yann]

before the storm destroy crocuses...

Crocus chrysanthus 'Eyecatcher'
Crocus tommasinianus 'Lilac Beauty'
Crocus seisumsiana

[Janis Ruksans]

I was not entering new pictures at first for trip to Spain together with daffodil lovers and after returning I had surgical treatment on my eye so my working capacity at computer and with reading etc. for some time was and still will be limited.
Here I'm entering picture of Iranian crocus about which is known only that it came from Iran and was sent out by Giesen BG - I named it as C. iranicus, but I'm not sure is the name correct. Several Iranian crocuses are visually quite similar.
Next is Crocus kerndorfiorum, few years it looked very poorly,, but this spring seem that recovered.
And last 3 pictures shows crocus about which I had hard discussion with Kerndorff - it is Crocus mawii. The first two pictures are from crocus received as mawii from Kerndorff's partner in research Erich Pasche. Although both are from same acquisition, you can easy see the great difference in position of stigma, regarded by Kerndorff as quite important feature in separating of species. The third is the same crocus which I used for front cover picture of my book and about which I got very "sharp" mail from Kerndorff - that it isn't true and only commercial fraud from my side. It was collected very closely to supposed type locality of C. mawii and I really can't identify it under other name. Unfortunately the data about type locality of C. mawii is so incorrectly published, that for identification I used exclusively morphological features. Only position of stigma in this plant is below anther tips, but such are 27% of wild population (according Kerndorff) and same looks one of E. Pasche's plants. Stigmatic branches according original description "often held tightly together" but not so on Pasche's plants. So I remain to my opinion that I correctly identified this as albino of C. mawii.

[Janis Ruksans]

Some more crocuses from last week.
At first is Crocus olivieri from W Turkey. This year it is very bright, really orange, but not so impressive as balansae from Samos Island.
From Iranian crocuses in this entry C. sanandajensis published by HKEP and collected for my in Iran by my friend at supposed locus classicus.
Follow  selected form of Crocus sieberi from Crete named by me as 'White Giant'- due very huge size of flowers - just as Dutch so named C. vernus, although this season flowers are smaller than usually.
and as last unusually coloured new crocus species from C. veluchensis group. At its locality almost all plants has more or less expressed yellow shade, sometimes only just-just visible, in the throat. There are some other features confirming its status as new different species.