In the garden, Colchicum or meadow saffron, is a beautiful and intriguing bulb with two seasons of interest: the first in the spring with beautiful, lush foliage and the second in the fall when the white, pink or purple-pink flowers are produced in profusion.
Bred right here in Canada, Alan McMurtrie is creating new colours and colour patterns never seen before in the reticulated iris. Learn more about his amazing cultivars.
Through their beauty and unusual flower patterns, Broken Tulips offer not just a pretty display but a connection to a dramatic and tumultuous history.
Cyclamen is a genus of plants known best for the florist cultivars of large, boldy-coloured flowers and dramatic mottled foliage grown as decorative, seasonal or short-lived pot plants. Many people remain unaware that there are species that are hardy in temperate gardens or that they are in leaf and in bloom in the fall, winter, and early spring!
Bulbs, corms, and rhizomes represent a particular life history strategy that has evolved in almost every region of the world. Applied to gardens, they offer us beauty, intrigue, and additional strategies for layering in interest and colour. Explore some of the most interesting oddball bulbs for your patio or garden.
Erythronium is a genus of shady bulbs from North America and Eurasia that form beautiful carpets of ephemeral spring flowers on the forest floors of their native regions. They are known as fawn lilies, trout lilies, and dogtooth violets. They can be used for beautiful early spring displays in the shade garden.
Corydalis solida is a beautiful spring ephemeral that blooms in the shade garden when most perennials are still dormant. Plant them in clumps or drifts to give you colour and spring inspiration at the very beginning of the season.
The beautiful wood anemones or windflowers produce carpets of dainty foliage and masses of beautiful flowers in shades of white, yellow, pink, lavender, and pale blue in early spring. Plant them in drifts in your shade garden to put on a show when your Hosta and ferns are only just thinking of breaking dormancy.
Few garden plants offer flowers held in perfect spheres or dramatic fireworks. The ornamental onions or Allium are not be missed for dramatic and beautiful spring and summer displays.
Crocus are the temperate world's favourite early spring bulb. They are beautiful and long-lived but also tough as nails with an amazing ability to shrug off the vagaries of early spring weather. They also come in various forms not commonly seen in garden centres. Explore all that Crocus have to offer!
Few bulbs can create the kind of drama that foxtail lilies offer with their rockets of lily-like flowers reaching three, four, five, six, even eight feet high, depending on the species and cultivar you choose. Learn more about the amazing Eremurus!
Camassia or camas lilies are western North American native bulbs that occur from southern British Columbia to California and inland into the western mountains. They form spikes typically one to three feet tall of starry, lily-like flowers in white and various shades of blue. Learn more about these native beauties.
Lilies offer beauty and fragrance and a succession of blooms from spring until late summer. They can also be inserted into small spaces between other plants to add a whole extra layer of colour into the garden.
Next to tulips, daffodils are probably the second most beloved of the spring bulbs, the proverbial runner up in spring's popularity contest. They don't have the broad colour range of the tulips but they are beautiful and dependable coming back year after year with ever expanding clumps. Explore the surprising diversity of the humble daffodil.
Fritillaria are unusual yet beautiful bulbs guaranteed to add botanical intrigue to your garden and containers.
