The message
from (jane) contains these words:

True. If it were just pollen then it would be a lot simpler. But then
again pink and whitebells are invariably Spanish anyway, regardless of
any other characteristic!

Not so. When I was ickle, back in the '40s we used to find white ones
wild in Warley Woods (Near Brentwood) and the occasional intermediate
pink ones. The chances of Spanish ones appearing deep in ancient
woodland in tose days is pretty minimal.

In retrospect from this thread, looking at the weedy cluster I have,
which has cream pollen, thin leaves and is labelled English bluebell
from cultivated stock, the bells are far too pale for them to be 100%,
and quite a few of them stick upwards. I am tending to think it's an
almost-but-not-quite Englishbell :-/

I've lots of Spaniards in the garden, ad some old ex-potted hyacinths
which are slumming.

There will be hybrids of straight hybrids and English which would tend
towards English in appearance but not quite have all of the
characteristics. I think that's why the questionnaire - it's not as
simple as a straight cross as Spanish have been here rather too long.

And why I reckon they are doing the survey in the first place!

Bit difficult to put the clock back. Besides, is it PC?

--
Tony
Replace solidi with dots to reply: tony/anson snailything zetnet/co/uk

http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi

Hussein M. wrote in
:

I don't know quite how erect and striped Scillas are, but the plants I
got from Florajacs and the flowers portrayed on the Spanish site,
apart form having a mauvey tinge which is absent from the plants
pictured on bioimages, BBC etc. which are a deep velvety blue, also
have an unmistakable darker streak running down the petals and do not
have the drooping posture exhibited by the 'proper' pictures of
non-scripta.

Um, fairly sure that native bluebells vary a good bit too. Lydford Gorge
ones I saw last week are quite purply (to my eyes). Dulverton a few weeks
earlier seemed paler and bluer (maybe they get darker over time?). Both
more or less 'wild'. I would expect the colours and the stripyness to vary
a bit according to aspect, soil, light, and so on.

I spent a lot of time playing in bluebell woods in S Wales as a child, and
we used to compete to find 'the stripiest', 'darkest', 'most bells on one
stalk' and so on. As I recall, the ones you found at the edges of the
woods tended to be a bit paler.

Victoria

In article , jane
mnospamon.co.uk writes
well this site (which I mentioned previously) is pretty much that.
http://www.plantlife.org.uk/bluebell/home.htm

In it is http://www.plantlife.org.uk/bluebell/plants.htm
which has a nice little interactive question and answer applet which
not only gives you information of the three types (English, Spanish
and hybrid) but allows you to feed in characteristics of whatever you
have in your plot/area and identify which you have.

The pollen's the biggest giveaway, which I now know the *right* way
round!!! Both hybrid and Spanish have blue/purple pollen, which I've
verified by going out in my back garden where I've got three huge
clumps of Hispanica, and it's definitely blue!

But cream is not guarantee of native. I have a big clump of a tough,
wide leaved bluebell with upright stems with flowers all the way around,
with flaring bells in a pale blue - and cream pollen.
~

--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm

On Wed, 7 May 2003 08:01:00 +0000 (UTC),
(jane) wrote:

On Tue, 06 May 2003 21:07:17 +0100, Hussein M.
wrote:

~On Tue, 06 May 2003 20:09:30 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
~
~On Tue, 06 May 2003 03:21:59 +0100, Hussein M. wrote:
~
~ I will have to phone my friend so he can drive me to the famous
~ local bluebell woods where I know they are non-scripta.
~
~Dig about on the net to find definative(*) ways of telling the
~difference, flower colour alone is not good enough. I have vague
~memories of the way the individual flower bells are arranged on the
~stem is the best method, one has them arranged all round the other
~tends to have them on one side. I *think* the English is all round but
~with the hybrids about gawd alone knows what happens. Combined with
~the pollen colour previously discussed and you can have a high
~confidence level on your identification.
~
~(*) If you can ever get a "definative" answer from the net. B-)

In it is http://www.plantlife.org.uk/bluebell/plants.htm
which has a nice little interactive question and answer applet which
not only gives you information of the three types (English, Spanish
and hybrid) but allows you to feed in characteristics of whatever you
have in your plot/area and identify which you have.

The pollen's the biggest giveaway, which I now know the *right* way
round!!! Both hybrid and Spanish have blue/purple pollen, which I've
verified by going out in my back garden where I've got three huge
clumps of Hispanica, and it's definitely blue!

Florajacs - I did a count of the plants - for a while back there I
was seeing plants looking more like ... and was wondering if there
had been bluebells in the garden before I took over. But no, they're
all the same and the count (garden seems to be swimming in them) is
more or less what you would expect - after one year of division and
dispersal.

Leaves up to 25 mm etc. etc.

I definitely have hybrids by the plantlife survey and think it's about
time to get the bluebell situation sorted. So i will start a few in a
tub like I said before - making sure they are of excellent provenance.

I know it may be a lost cause what with all the town councils
whacking in all the hybrids but there must surely be an enterprising
person who realises that people are prepared to pay good money for the
real thing - they are after all so much lovelier, especially close to
as cut flowers.

The supplier linked by the bluebell action type sites is:
Landlife Wildflowers On-Line seed and plant store.
http://www.wildflower.org.uk/shop/shop2.htm
But they don't have bluebells springing out at you, only wildflower
mixes etc.

The Herb Garden & Historical Plants Nursery - herbs, wild flowers &
native species
http://www.historicalplants.co.uk/section1.html

have this caveat (offering non-s at 1.50)

quoteWe reserve the right to increase any prices should the need
arise.

Plant names listed are believed to be correct. However this cannot be
completely guaranteed as plants sometimes originate via other
plantspeople where differences may occur.

/quote

I think you going to your garden centre (snowdrops man) and having a
good shufty as they are in bloom now and you have your ready reckoner
what with your plantlife link.

I am going to phone our local one man band and have a look at his if
he says he has some.


Am I forgiven for losing my rag over that signature of yours? Just
wish he had used the word "dreams".

Hussein
Grow a little garden

spam block - for real addy, reverse letters of second level domain.

On Wed, 07 May 2003 18:03:02 +0100, Hussein M. wrote:

massive snip

going off topic folks

~ I think you going to your garden centre (snowdrops man) and having a
~good shufty as they are in bloom now and you have your ready reckoner
~what with your plantlife link.

I am thinking so
~
~ I am going to phone our local one man band and have a look at his if
~he says he has some.

good luck
~
~
~ Am I forgiven for losing my rag over that signature of yours? Just
~wish he had used the word "dreams".

I hadn't even noticed till you said. Had to save messages and search them
to find out what you were on about.

Hey, I like it. I've used it as my .sig for some 7 years now and usually it
gets positive response, if any.
I live under the illusion that people aren't all as portrayed on soaps, the
news, the tabloids or the weekly mags. Usually they're not, or life really
would be horrid. People help on this group, for instance, people they've
never met. Doesn't matter what they look like, sound like or do.

(However I have no illusions left about the possibility that there are any
plumbers in this area who can change radiator valves, given I've spent five
years trying to get one out to do it!!!!)

There's one thing for sure.. I daren't use some of Twain's cat quotes on
this newsgroup!

MInd you... folk might agree with

"A cat is more intelligent than people believe, and can be taught any
crime"

but definitely NOT

"If man could be crossed with the cat, it would improve man but deteriorate
the cat"

grin before anyone jumps in here...


--
jane

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone,
you may still exist but you have ceased to live.
Mark Twain

Please remove nospam from replies, thanks!

On Wed, 07 May 2003 15:21:08 +0100, Victoria Clare
wrote:


I don't know quite how erect and striped Scillas are, but the plants I
got from Florajacs and the flowers portrayed on the Spanish site,
apart form having a mauvey tinge which is absent from the plants
pictured on bioimages, BBC etc. which are a deep velvety blue, also
have an unmistakable darker streak running down the petals and do not
have the drooping posture exhibited by the 'proper' pictures of
non-scripta.

Um, fairly sure that native bluebells vary a good bit too. Lydford Gorge
ones I saw last week are quite purply (to my eyes). Dulverton a few weeks
earlier seemed paler and bluer (maybe they get darker over time?). Both
more or less 'wild'. I would expect the colours and the stripyness to vary
a bit according to aspect, soil, light, and so on.

I spent a lot of time playing in bluebell woods in S Wales as a child, and
we used to compete to find 'the stripiest', 'darkest', 'most bells on one
stalk' and so on. As I recall, the ones you found at the edges of the
woods tended to be a bit paler.

Yes, Victoria, I take your point. I am sure the wild bluebell has
variations in colour depending on how much light it has been exposed
to etc. but I think we are here talking in different orders of
magnitude. Same with the stripes. I think the pollen would have to be
cream, the leaves narrow and all the flowers coming off one side of
the flower stem. And yes you would have to look for stripey ones and
the most upright ones etc. (as being unusually so).

When you say the plants at Lydford Gorge and Dulverton were both
more or less 'wild'. I wonder and whether this is not why people are
creating a ruck - because the Spanish bluebell is very well adapted to
our conditions and, having naturalised itself, is taking over like the
grey squirrel from the red - but more surreptitiously (grey wirrals
don't mix their genes with the red)


Mine are definitely hybrids on too many counts.


Hussein
Grow a little garden

spam block - for real addy, reverse letters of second level domain.

On Wed, 7 May 2003 19:55:31 +0000 (UTC),
(jane) wrote:

On Wed, 07 May 2003 18:03:02 +0100, Hussein M. wrote:

massive snip

going off topic folks

even more massive snip

"If man could be crossed with the cat, it would improve man but deteriorate
the cat"

To alt.lifes.musings

(Dýa reckon?)


The Cheshire Cat
Grow a little garden

spam block - for real addy, reverse letters of second level domain.

"Hussein M." wrote:

On Wed, 7 May 2003 08:01:00 +0000 (UTC),
(jane) wrote:

On Tue, 06 May 2003 21:07:17 +0100, Hussein M.
wrote:

~On Tue, 06 May 2003 20:09:30 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
~
~On Tue, 06 May 2003 03:21:59 +0100, Hussein M. wrote:
~
~ I will have to phone my friend so he can drive me to the famous
~ local bluebell woods where I know they are non-scripta.
~
~Dig about on the net to find definative(*) ways of telling the
~difference, flower colour alone is not good enough. I have vague
~memories of the way the individual flower bells are arranged on the
~stem is the best method, one has them arranged all round the other
~tends to have them on one side. I *think* the English is all round but
~with the hybrids about gawd alone knows what happens. Combined with
~the pollen colour previously discussed and you can have a high
~confidence level on your identification.
~
~(*) If you can ever get a "definative" answer from the net. B-)

In it is http://www.plantlife.org.uk/bluebell/plants.htm
which has a nice little interactive question and answer applet which
not only gives you information of the three types (English, Spanish
and hybrid) but allows you to feed in characteristics of whatever you
have in your plot/area and identify which you have.

The pollen's the biggest giveaway, which I now know the *right* way
round!!! Both hybrid and Spanish have blue/purple pollen, which I've
verified by going out in my back garden where I've got three huge
clumps of Hispanica, and it's definitely blue!

Florajacs - I did a count of the plants - for a while back there I
was seeing plants looking more like ... and was wondering if there
had been bluebells in the garden before I took over. But no, they're
all the same and the count (garden seems to be swimming in them) is
more or less what you would expect - after one year of division and
dispersal.

Leaves up to 25 mm etc. etc.

I definitely have hybrids by the plantlife survey and think it's about
time to get the bluebell situation sorted. So i will start a few in a
tub like I said before - making sure they are of excellent provenance.

I know it may be a lost cause what with all the town councils
whacking in all the hybrids but there must surely be an enterprising
person who realises that people are prepared to pay good money for the
real thing - they are after all so much lovelier, especially close to
as cut flowers.

I don't know if this is true, but I was told recently that recent
legislation attempting to protect English bluebells had made it illegal to
sell real ones commercially. Thus the nurseries have no choice, even when
they raise them from seed themselves. And conservationists/councils end up
planting hybrids and exacerbating the situation.
Anita



The supplier linked by the bluebell action type sites is:
Landlife Wildflowers On-Line seed and plant store.
http://www.wildflower.org.uk/shop/shop2.htm
But they don't have bluebells springing out at you, only wildflower
mixes etc.

The Herb Garden & Historical Plants Nursery - herbs, wild flowers &
native species
http://www.historicalplants.co.uk/section1.html

have this caveat (offering non-s at 1.50)

quoteWe reserve the right to increase any prices should the need
arise.

Plant names listed are believed to be correct. However this cannot be
completely guaranteed as plants sometimes originate via other
plantspeople where differences may occur.

/quote

I think you going to your garden centre (snowdrops man) and having a
good shufty as they are in bloom now and you have your ready reckoner
what with your plantlife link.

I am going to phone our local one man band and have a look at his if
he says he has some.


Am I forgiven for losing my rag over that signature of yours? Just
wish he had used the word "dreams".

Hussein
Grow a little garden

spam block - for real addy, reverse letters of second level domain.

--
************************************************** *************************
Dr Anita Malhotra e-mail:
School of Biological Sciences Tel(direct line): + 44 1248 383735
University of Wales Bangor Fax: + 44 1248 371644
Gwynedd LL57 2UW
United Kingdom
************************************************** *************************

In message , Janet Galpin and Oliver
Patterson writes
The message
from "dave @ stejonda" contains these words:

I recently bought some bluebells from Florajacs

If the Florajac bluebells are indeed not English then I will
be extremely unhappy

It would be very worrying if a set-up as big as that is sending out vast
quantities of misnamed bluebells.
Could you perhaps ask them for a definite assertion either way rather
than waiting a year to find out?

I emailed questions to Florajacs on the evening of the 5th. They have
yet to reply.

--
dave @ stejonda

?why do Americans chatter during live theatre?

On Thu, 08 May 2003 09:43:19 +0100, "A.Malhotra"
wrote:


I know it may be a lost cause what with all the town councils
whacking in all the hybrids but there must surely be an enterprising
person who realises that people are prepared to pay good money for the
real thing - they are after all so much lovelier, especially close to
as cut flowers.

I don't know if this is true, but I was told recently that recent
legislation attempting to protect English bluebells had made it illegal to
sell real ones commercially. Thus the nurseries have no choice, even when
they raise them from seed themselves. And conservationists/councils end up
planting hybrids and exacerbating the situation.
Anita

Thankfully Scots Harry - 65 year old Mr Fixit says he has the real
thing. He sometimes makes extravagant claims like on this occasion
"The bulbs have been there since the house was built on a bluebell
wood." Actually I can imagine the back garden is fairly original -
it's a very steep incline indeed and nobody would have been doing much
with it until Harry built some way of getting to it.

I've asked to examine the plants before accepting them. Strange. He
seems to be a culling situation ("I just dug a load up yesterday.").
He confirms they are different to the ones in my garden and was
tickled by my enthusiasm.

Happy days - maybe

Hussein

Grow a little garden

spam block - for real addy, reverse letters of second level domain.