Re: Any hellebore experts out there?
- Subject: Re: Any hellebore experts out there?
- From: T* &* M* R*
- Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2001 10:36:49 +1200
Joe Seals wrote:
>
> Nan:
>
> I LOVE hellebores. I never personally grew them in
> California, though (plenty in IL, SC, and PA).
>
> H. lividus has the best flowers of the three but none
> of these three species are truly attractive in flower
> compared to the familiar "Lenten Rose" and "Christmas
> Rose" -- unless you like green flowers.
> There's a nice H. lividus x H. niger hybrid called
> 'December Dawn'. There's a H. argutifolius x H. niger
> hybrid named 'Alabaster'. And there's plenty of
> hybrids of H. argutifolius x H. lividus, which I think
> might prove to be the best for So. Cal. Included
> among the latter are 'Blackthorn' and 'Bouoghton
> Beauty'. By the way, these are all technically
> "strains" (not cultivars); there's some variation
> within the named type.
Some forms of H lividus do have pinkish flowers, especially the
selection sold as H X sternii which If you can find it can be very
handsone with flowers of good size and subatance as well as having some
pink in the flower
I am lucky that H orientalis will grow with great eaase in my garden as
long as I stick to shade. A lot of recent work has been done here on H.
orientalis and the most beautiful selections are available, everything
from deep red to a truely enormous white and even white flowers with a
pink picotee.
New Zealand also boasts a locally-bred improved H niger with very big
flowers known as White Magic.
Moira
--
Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
Wainuiomata, New Zealand, SW Pacific. 12 hours ahead of Greenwich Time
