True Blue

Blue is a relatively rare color in flowers, especially in its purer shades. This Tecophilia cyanocrocus was in bloom a few weeks ago at Wave Hill, a small but wonderful public garden in the Bronx. This is one of those plants that is very difficult to find in commerce, but much coveted by plant enthusiasts. It is a winter growing cormous plant from the mountains near Santiago, Chile. Long thought extinct in nature, it has been recently rediscovered in the wild. A good thing, since it is an amazingly beautiful plant. The form shown here has white at the base of the petals, but an all blue form also exists.

I finally got seed of this plant from the Archibald's seed list (an English couple who collect wild seeds and produce seed from their own garden/greenhouse plants) and have a small pot of several seedlings growing now. I will let them go dormant soon, and maybe in a year or more likely two, I might see some flowers like the ones above. Seed germinates best at cool, not freezing, temperatures, and should be sown in fall or early winter to grow during the cooler months. Mine grew under lights before going outdoors when the weather got better, but a cool greenhouse would be the ideal situation, unless one lives in coastal California or some other similar climate-blessed locale.