Bounteous beauty can be enjoyed in the garden and the home with Fall-flowering bulbs. However, when most flowers are gone, colchicums, Autumn crocuses, sternbergias, and hardy amaryllis stage their gay display.
From late August until Winter draws the curtain, they are wonderful for rock gardens, perennial borders, and indoor gardens where they make an elaborate showing. All are easily grown and merit wider use.
Colchicums, Autumn crocuses, and sternbergias flower very soon after planting, and they should be purchased early, in August or September, and planted immediately for best results.
The hardy amaryllis is different; it requires a season to become established. These may be planted either in early spring or late fall. Once settled and left undisturbed, they will be a joy for years.
Colchicums
Colchicums, or meadow saffrons, flower almost before you can believe it, sending up large crocus-like blossoms in succession for many weeks.
Nearly any soil or situation will do, but they prefer moderately rich loam, good drainage, and shallow planting at about 3” inches deep. They multiply readily, soon forming colonies of glorious blooms.
They are very effective when set in carpets of dwarf phlox, arahis, or aubrietas. Indoors they may be grown in peat moss, soil, or mica-gro; they will bloom anyway, even without soil or water. The flower colors are all tones of pinkish lilac to rosy purple, violet, and white.
Newer Hybrids
The newer hybrids are larger, freer-flowering, and stronger-growing. The double white and waterlily forms are handsome in the garden and make exceptionally good pot plants.
From the original species of C. autumnal, a mauve purple, many new forms have been developed, such as the following:
- C. autumnal album, pure white
- C. autumnal album plenum, the double white form
- C. autumnale major, with rosy purple flowers
Colchicum speciosum is undoubtedly the best of the genus. It is strong-growing, with large 5” to 6” inch, rosy-purple blooms over a long period.
The hybrids of this are Lilac Wonder, violet mauve; Violet Queen, deep purplish violet with a white center; and Waterlily, a large double-flowered beauty with bright rosy lilac blossoms.
This is the prize of them all. It is still expensive, but well worth the price. C. giganteum has large, soft violet, almost pink flowers. C. bornmuelleri is also large-flowering, with clear violet, white-throated blooms.
Autumn Crocuses
Natives to the Swiss Alps, growing wild in the valleys and on the hills, Autumn crocuses carpet the countryside in the Fall with glorious hues of violet.
They will also tolerate most conditions, provided the soil is well-drained and not deeply planted. Like colchicums, they flower soon after planting and should be started in August and September.
These make beautiful displays indoors or out and are truly beautiful when grown in shallow, decorative bowls, interplanted with grass to cover their naked stems. Most fall varieties flower without foliage; Crocus long if torus is the exception.
C. speciosus, the earliest flower, has the bluest tone and is enhanced in color by the contrasting orange anthers.
C. speciosus albus is pure white. C. conatus, native to the hills of Lebanon in Palestine, is rosy lilac with orange anthers.
It flowers as speciosus is waning. C. longicorns is the beauty of them all. The bright, gay, Sicilian-blue blooms, with their yellow throats and rich orange stigmas, against their green foliage, present an unusually rare combination of colors.
Sternbergia Lutea
These “Autumn daffodils” are the favorite flowers in the temple gardens of Virginia and are very popular in England.
They will provide a glowing touch of gold to the Fall landscape, and their blooms will blend beautifully with the violet colors of the Autumn crocus.
They, too, are planted in August and September, about 4″ inches deep, in loamy, well-drained soil and full sun. However, unlike the other hardy fall bulbs, these have a rosette of foliage that perfectly contrasts with the blooms’ color.
In the North, they need full sun so that the foliage will ripen off before Winter sets. In farther south, the foliage winters over, ripening in June.
They naturalize easily and beautify the not-too-color Autumn landscape and the rock garden.
Hardy Amaryllis
Lycoris squamigera, when once established, is a joy to behold. With delightful fragrance, the large, soft rose-pink, lily-like blooms burst forth on 2-feet stems in mid-August. The broad strap-like foliage appears in the Spring and disappears in June.
They like loamy soil, light shade, and fairly deep planting. If colonized with the foliage of other plants, they return each August with beautiful color and fragrance. Unlike the previous three groups, these may be planted in early spring or late fall.
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