[pbs] Fragrance in colchicums
Jane McGary
janemcgary at earthlink.net
Fri Sep 22 19:42:19 EDT 2006
Jim McKenney's note about fragrant colchicums led me to go around sniffing
them this morning. Some had no noticeable fragrance. C. bivonae and most of
its many hybrids have a faint fragrance that reminds me of lemon trees. The
most fragrant was the hybrid 'Dick Trotter', which has a sweet scent
similar to Ivory bath soap. Interestingly, the commercial form of C. x
agrippinum had no scent I could detect, but the form I grow that was found
in an old Portland garden is honey-scented. C. variegatum, one of the
parents of this natural hybrid, had no fragrance (but magnificent bloom
after our hot summer). C. speciosum is almost unscented, so the big hybrids
must get their fragrance from their C. bivonae ancestry.
Jane McGary
Northwestern Oregon, USA
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