In article ,
kay wrote:

Bob Hobden;999904 Wrote:

Dry shade is the accepted position for them. However, because we had a
large
tree cut down the ones I planted under it are now in full sun in our
open
front south facing garden and they haven't read the book. They get baked
every summer and are gradually taking over the garden even seeding in
the
grass, and the block paving, there must be hundreds of little seedlings
out
there at the moment everywhere you look. I will have to do something
eventually.

I suspect what it means (like quite a few plants we grow in shade in the
garden) that they do well in shade, but like sun when they get it. I
have a gravel covered terrace at the south of the house, and have
planted both C hederifolium and C coum. The coum have been in full
flower for several weeks, and are absolutely covered with blossom, a
solid pink mass, over 50 flowers per corm, and these are small corms
which only went in last spring. And there are seedlings from the three
older ones all over the place, including little patches with a dozen or
more seedlings as thick as mustard-and-cress.

I haven't seen C coum in the wild, but I've C hederifolium at the top of
limestone mountains in the Aegean, forcing its way through limestone
chippings about 3 inches across, or peeking out of cracks in solid
limestone slabs. These treeless summits are about as far away as you can
imagine from our traditional C hederifolium habitat of dry shade.

I presume the key thing is that they don't like their corm to be sitting
in wet soil over the winter.

Precisely. I found my C. coum in the very dry rain shadow under
a thick conifer, and replanted in the equally dry rain shadow
under the eaves, and they have formed a solid mat. They both
hibernate and estivate, and have leaves only in spring and
autumn (for some meaning of), and relish the total lack of
competition. Even weeds don't grow there! My understanding is
that they do exactly the same in their natural habitat - it is
waterless both in summer and winter (under the ice/snow).


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.