March in the Northern Hemisphere

[Véronique Macrelle]

very happy with the development of the leaves on my Arum. It's much prettier when there are fewer slugs! I hope I'll finally see a fleru of A. creticum, which is magnificent this year.

[Véronique Macrelle]

in the greenhouse:
- Viola eizanensis is starting to flower: it's fragrant.
- Ficaria verna ‘Ken Aslet’: I thought it would provide me with some pollen for cross-breeding, but no.
- a yellow Helleborus, unnamed.

[Jeffnz]

Your yellow hellebore is an anemone form, was this your own seedling?

[Leena]

Veronique, beautiful yellow Helleborus! And also other interesting plants.

[Véronique Macrelle]

the yellow Helleborus and this double white come from the production and selection of Sandrine and Thierry Delabroye.
https://www.les-vivaces-de-sandrine-et-thierry.fr/
they open a few doors when their hellebores are in flower (hundreds of them!), often unnamed.
 It's a good opportunity to compare shapes and colours.
I avoid flowers that look upwards, though, as I find they get damaged in our winter rains.
 I like this shape of anemone.
 I don't usually buy such expensive plants, but it was between 2 Covid confinements . and at the 1 open house they were able to hold (there weren't many people there) I felt I had to support them ... while enjoying myself



Are hellebores self-fertilising? In 3 years I've never had any seeds formed on this yellow, despite manual pollination.

[Jeffnz]

A visit from bees is required for pollination, even then there are flowers that do not get pollinated and therefore no seed set.

[Mariette]

A nice range of flowers, Véronique!

Indoors, the lovely scented Neomarica candida is flowering.



These crocus came as Crocus exiguus to me - I like the striped ones!



This pale blue form of Scilla / Chionodoxa sardensis has still to bulk up.



Scilla bifolia feels at home in my garden. In the past, I planted blue, pink and white ones, which started to mix their genes. The purplish ones show the influence of the pink forms.

[Mariette]

There are light blue Scilla bifolia, now.



Blue ones with white ovary. (hybrids?)



And definitely hybrids.

[Véronique Macrelle]

 I also have Scilla bifolia. A wild form from eastern France that someone gave me, but I find that it doesn't reproduce much, so I'm thinking of moving it to another spot for next season.
the violas are flowering very well this year, which isn't always the case. on the other hand, V. prionantha is usually huge, but this year they're all quite small or late. on the other hand, I've finally had enough of Viola eizanensis, which is explosive this year. I've never had so many: some flowers are over 3 cm long, as in the photo.

To keep a species of Viola, you always need to have a good number of individuals (you're never safe from sudden death) and accept that they sometimes grow in the pot of another plant, because that's what they prefer, it seems...

-Scilla bifolia
-Viola jooi, freshly opened flower
-Viola jooi
-Viola eizanensis
-Viola prionantha

[Leena]

Veronique, violas are so nice plants! I think I also have V.prionantha, I will have to check in the spring, and also V.eizanensis germinated, but I'm not sure if they are alive. I have tried V.jooi, but I didn't get them to germinate. Viola hirsutula has grown here almost 10 years, and is a nice plant, but it hasn't increased or given seeds. There is only that one plant.

Mariette, your different colour variants of Scilla bifolia are very nice, I especially liked the pale blue one.
I have now in recent years planted different kinds of Scillas, and began to wonder how easily they hybridize? If I will have pure species at all after some years.
My nicest one is this S.bifolia 'Taurica' from Augis Bulbs, it is a very large one.
These pictures are from last spring.

[Rick R.]

Love all the plants !!!

Veronique (or anyone), I have had Viola eizanensis grown from seed from Growild for five+ years now.  Seed germinated well and plants grow fine.  However they never flower, but do produce cleistogamous seed.  They jump around, seeding in pots, but I am not sure I want to try them in the garden, as they seem like they might seed everywhere.  Any ideas to encourage flowering?  Do you remember how long from seed it took for flowering?

It's funny, because for me Leibnitzia anandria flowers more easily in pots than in the ground (both produce cleistogamous seed).

[Jeffnz]

Acording to Dr Google the largest genus of cleistogamous plants is Viola.

[Véronique Macrelle]

I think that most Violas can flower from the 2nd spring after germination, or even the 1st spring after germination.
But they are temperamental and don't always flower, and I don't really know why.
This year, all my Violas flowered a lot, and all my pots of Viola eizanensis in the greenhouse had big flowers - a first here!
On the other hand, I've lost V. chaerophiloides ‘Beni Zuru’. So I'm leaving all the Violas that are being reseeded everywhere in the hope that they'll come back...

Viola prionantha also flowered well, but with smaller flowers than usual; it was very cute.
Here, V. prionantha always flowers outside in a trough, and not always in pots in the greenhouse. In the trough, it gets thirsty in summer.

My soil is so heavy that prionantha and eizanensis don't stay in the ground.

 I think you can try Viola eizanensis in the garden, it's never a pest to me.
But I do like an ‘untidy garden’.

 I find that Violas feel better when you let them go where they want (often in other people's pots). I leave them in when it doesn't bother the other plants too much: they don't prevent the germination of seeds that need several seasons to germinate (Paeonia, for example). On the contrary, they prevent the pot from drying out too much (they wilt when there's not enough water). Sometimes I pull out a few or transplant them as small plants.

A Viola selkirki, 1 to 3 cm high, almost never gets in the way of its companion plant, but on the contrary makes a lovely ground cover for a pot.

In fact, I've seen my violas flower every year, more or less, since I've got enough individuals per species.

[Véronique Macrelle]

-Germinated last year, this undetermined Viola (Viola x palmata?) appears to have already produced a flower, albeit a small one.
- Viola selkirkii
-Viola selkirkii foliage
-Viola variegata
-Viola variegata

[Mariette]

I marvel at Your collection of violas, Véronique! Unfortunately, they are too prone to slug damage to be an option in my garden.

Some of my camellias produce chance seedlings. I wonder why the larger part of the seedlings from single japonicas show more or less double flowers.