Bulb Day 1 October 2023

AGS Bulb Day (in collaboration with the Fritillaria Group)

Sunday, 1 October 2023 10.00 am – 4.00 pm

Admission by advance ticket only

At Pershore College, Avonbank, Pershore, Worcestershire, WR10 3JP.
There will be the opportunity to buy plants from specialist nurseries and to visit the AGS garden and headquarters.
Tickets for lectures, buffet lunch, plant sales, tea and coffee.

Programme for the day

10.00 Registration, plant sales & coffee

10.30 – 11.30 CHRISTINE SKELMERSDALE: – “Tulips – from the species of Central Asia to the modern Dutch bulb fields. The history of this ubiquitous spring bulb”

Christine will look at species in the wild in the Tien Shan, their movement west with the Ottomans and their evolution into the modern cultivars via tulip fever and Flemish art, and finally the resurrection of the healthy tulip and the breeding of the modern cultivars in the twentieth century.

11.45 – 12.45 PAUL CUMBLETON – “Amaryllids in my bulb collection”

Paul will illustrate some of the Amaryllids he grows now or has grown in the past. He will reveal practical growing tips, concentrating on the more uncommon members of the family rather than the familiar ones. The talk will focus mainly, but not entirely, on Southern hemisphere bulbs.

13.00 Plant sales and buffet lunch

14.00 – 15.00 LAURENCE HILL – “Fritillaria with the habit of a Lily”

Laurence will discuss Fritillaria subgenus Liliorhiza from Arizona to West Sayan. This subgenus is centred on North America, but with outlying species in Asia. The lecture title plays on John Lindley’s first account of Fritillaria liliacea in 1834 which he described as, ‘a most remarkable plant with the habit of a Lily’.

15.00 Plant sales, coffee, visit to AGS centre and garden, and display of botanical paintings

16.00 End of day

Nurseries: Buried Treasure, Pottertons