Crocus pocus

People who raise rare breeds of pigeons are called 'fanciers'. If ponies light your fire, your so-called friends probably describe you as 'horsey'. Stamp-collectors are 'philatelists' which, for reasons that no doubt say much more about me than convicted sex offenders, reminds me of the (true but apparently exaggerated) story of a group of women in Southampton, who chased a local paediatrician down the street under the misapprehension that he or she was a child molester (see here).

I have already written on this blog about galanthophilia, a harmless but dangerously addictive way of whiling away the winter months gazing at snowdrops but now I would like to introduce you to another species of lunatic, the croconut. This excellent term was coined by John Grimshaw (see his blog here) to describe anyone fascinated by the genus Crocus.

Lunacy and me go together like celery and a Bloody Mary and so it will not surprise you to read that I am a trainee croconut. Being a novice, I find it extraordinarily difficult to identify these small, variable, frequently interfertile plants. There are of course keys, the best of which is in Brian Mathews' wonderful book, accurately but arguably unimaginatively titled 'Crocus'. Even I, however, balk at the prospect of dissecting a crocus to determine whether cataphylls, bracts and prophylls are present and so I rely on a friend who is vastly more expert than me at identifying these things to point me in the right direction.

On my travels in the Balkans, I have collected a few Crocus corms in quite a number of different places and they are now starting to flower, some for the first time. I do not know for sure what species any of the following should be ascribed to but they are all fascinating. Perhaps it will eventually become clear that many Crocus 'species' are blurred at the margins but I just haven't studied them closely enough in the wild to have an opinion. Anyway, there are some photos below of plants flowering now and tentative identifications suggested by my friend D. Suggestions on a postcard.

This first one was collected near Trebinje, In Bosnia-Hercegovina, at an altitude of about 275m. It has virtually no scent, to my nose. The leaves, as you can see, are narrow, with a prominent white stripe. The perinath tube is white. I have no idea what the corm looks like.

No yellow throat but still C. dalmaticus?

The golden wash on the outer tepals suggests C. dalmaticus

The next two were collected just a few miles away from the plants above but are clearly different. Are they C. vernus or C. tommasinianus? The perianth tube is white, suggesting the latter, but the shape of the flower is more reminiscent of the former.

Finally, two photographs of a Crocus species collected on Mount Orjen in Montenegro, at about 600m altitude. Again, the perianth tube is white. Unlike either of the plants above, this one has a delicious scent. Is it a hybrid between C. vernus and C. tommasinianus?