Hepatica 2021

[Peppa]

Hepatica nobilis is still in flower in the mountains. And what a find!

What a wonderful find and you have extremely good luck! 

[Leena]

Carsten, you have such a great gene pool in Hepaticas in the mountains, and a good eye to spot them:).

Here it has been cloudy and cold, the first picture is from earlier.
It is H.transsilvanica or H. x media (what is the difference in them?). I got it as H.crenatiloba, but it is not that. I posted a picture of this plant last year as H.crenatiloba, but later when the new leaves came, found out that it is not it. Very nice plant still.
In the second picture these are H.japonica I have grown from seeds, the maiden form is nice.
Third is bicolour H.nobilis (not so good picture because of the weather)
And in the last one H.japonica 'Shirayuki', still flowering so well:).

[Carsten]

Thanks to all. The double white was actually not my find but I have been succsessful, too. ;-)
@Joakim: It was on the same trip, an area with blue and some white ones, only very few rose types.
The foliage does not differ to the single types but the plants have a broad range of shapes. Often the flowers are quite weak with just a single bud. So you can't judge the plant by this single flower. Probably the flower is even better if cultivated with care.
Anemone nemorosa and Hepatica nobilis are overlapping a bit in bloom. In the mountains the season is a bit shorter as they start flowering right after the snow is melting (now) and normally it is already getting quite warm in May. So they mostly flower togeher.

[Herman Mylemans]

Carsten, you have such a great gene pool in Hepaticas in the mountains, and a good eye to spot them:).

Here it has been cloudy and cold, the first picture is from earlier.
It is H.transsilvanica or H. x media (what is the difference in them?). I got it as H.crenatiloba, but it is not that. I posted a picture of this plant last year as H.crenatiloba, but later when the new leaves came, found out that it is not it. Very nice plant still.
In the second picture these are H.japonica I have grown from seeds, the maiden form is nice.
Third is bicolour H.nobilis (not so good picture because of the weather)
And in the last one H.japonica 'Shirayuki', still flowering so well:).

Leena, the question what is the difference between transsilvanica and x media is very interesting. Maybe we can discuss it here. I found a picture from Jürgen Peters about leaves.
- At the moment I would say transsilvanica has creeping rhizomes and x media
  not.
- H. x media is generally sterile and is more clumping like nobilis.
- The shape of the leaves (incisions) is more transsilvanica but the leaves are
   more leathery as nobilis. Total leave from H. x media is more rounded than
   transsilvanica.
- Flowers larger than nobilis.

So now I am waiting for other answers.

[Carolyn]

That’s a very useful leaf comparison picture, Herman. Thanks!

[Leena]

Thank you Herman, that is very useful picture.
I will take a picture of the leaves of my nameless plant later.

[Gabriela]

Hepatica nobilis is still in flower in the mountains. And what a find!

Indeed, what good luck Carsten! They somehow look even more beautiful in the wild than in all the pictures with the potted plants.
I've seen quite few others pictures with wild H. nobilis blue but not white, so that's a special one

[Gabriela]

Leena, the question what is the difference between transsilvanica and x media is very interesting. Maybe we can discuss it here. I found a picture from Jürgen Peters about leaves.
- At the moment I would say transsilvanica has creeping rhizomes and x media
  not.
- H. x media is generally sterile and is more clumping like nobilis.
- The shape of the leaves (incisions) is more transsilvanica but the leaves are
   more leathery as nobilis. Total leave from H. x media is more rounded than
   transsilvanica.
- Flowers larger than nobilis.

So now I am waiting for other answers.

That's a good summary Herman.
I have one older clump of H. x media in the garden (probably 'Buis') and indeed it remained in a clump and is sterile for sure.
The lobes seem a bit more rounded than in transsilvanica.
Re flower size, I don't have enough plants to be able to generalize.

[Gabriela]

Too warm, cold, warm and cold again made it that some Hepatica growing with more shade are still flowering.
To note that from the same batch of H. nobilis multipetala with blue and pink flowers I previously show, 2 plants flowered purple.


And one of the most interesting find of this spring: a plant with large, multi-white flowers which have a blue eye when opening.
The foliage falls in between americana and acutiloba, like it happened in other occasions, leading more and more to the belief of hybrids between the 2 species.
But I await to see the new foliage, maybe it is more distinct.

[Michelle Swann]

Beautiful hepaticas Leena and Gabriela. More hepaticas have started flowering. The native ones are still in bud. Some pictures from the garden
Hepatica nobilis alba
Hepatica nobilis pink
Hepatica nobilis rubra plena
Hepatica nobilis var. pyrenaica
Hepatica nobilis var. pyrenaica

  These look stunning, I have been looking through some of your posts to see some of your lovely flowers.  The ones I have seen look amazing.  I am not entirely sure what I am doing with this forum and was struggling to find a way to reply to individual posts on a forum page, this  way seemed as good as any x.

[Peppa]

And one of the most interesting find of this spring: a plant with large, multi-white flowers which have a blue eye when opening.
The foliage falls in between americana and acutiloba, like it happened in other occasions, leading more and more to the belief of hybrids between the 2 species.
But I await to see the new foliage, maybe it is more distinct.

Interesting to see the picture. Was it mainly in an area with H. americana that you found this plant? I've heard that the two species aren't often found together, but have heard examples of populations being as close as 500 meters or so, which would not be an impossible distance for insect travel.

[Leena]

Gabriela, your multipetals are really pretty!

[johnw]

Love your palest white-blues. We got a few from your seed.

johnw

[Gabriela]

Interesting to see the picture. Was it mainly in an area with H. americana that you found this plant? I've heard that the two species aren't often found together, but have heard examples of populations being as close as 500 meters or so, which would not be an impossible distance for insect travel.

Yes Peppa, the plant was among a population of H. americana (mainly blue and purple) but there are H. acutiloba plants further away at the same locality (maybe more than 500 m away). It is not an area I visit often, given the distance to drive. That's why I speculated on the hybrid origin.
Indeed, is not often to find H. americana growing together with H. acutiloba, especially that they prefer slightly different growing conditions.

[Gabriela]

Thanks Leena and John.
In both cases, is nature's work