Crocus pelistericus
| Flowering Time |
Spring |
|
Distribution |
Macedonia; N Greece |
|
Native Climate |
Cold winter with snow cover, cool with regular rain in summer |
|
Wild Habitat |
Alpine tussock grass, moist or water running through it throughout the summer |
|
Distinctive Features |
Flower deep purple, glossy petalled, throat white. Corm tunic fine fibres, netted. Leaf with no white stripe on upper surface |
|
Closest Relatives |
|
|
Cultivation Requirements |
Keep moist throughout the year, slightly less so lat autumn and winter. Stand pot in 2cm of water throughout the summer. |
|
Availability |
Rarely from specialist bulb/seed suppliers. Several seed collections in recent years have brought this species into cultivation, hopefully seed will be produced in cultivation to make it more widely available |
'font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt'>Thanks to Darren Sleep for providing these photographs .
A plant of high mountains where the summer is relatively short, this species retains its leaves throughout the summer. By the onset of winter a new shoot has developed which will produce the next seasons flower soon after the winter snow melts. This pattern must be duplicated if the plant is to survive in lowland cultivation - a challenge in areas with warm, dry summers. The practice of standing potted corms in a saucer of water through the summer has enabled growers in the south of England to grow and flower this rare plant. However, more recently the same growers have experienced difficulty in maintaining this species. Moisture through the summer is important to success but standing water can become stagnant leading to problems with rotting, particularly at the neck of the corm, the rot then entering the whole corm through the growing point.
A hybrid with Crocus scardicus has been produced in cultivation at Gothenburg Botanic Gardens.