Well, it’s very cold and wet at mid-December and though I searched around I could find nothing in the way of flowers outside. I won’t count the weeds even though a scraggly dandelion tried to rise up to greet me. Instead we turn to the greenhouse where some reliable December flowers are happening.
The hoop-petticoat daffodils with their little megaphone shaped flowers are the earliest of the daffodils that we grow, typically flowering in early December in the greenhouse. They are native to Spain and are widely spread around the iberian peninsula and Morocco. I received mine from the Pacific Bulb Society in one of their many bulb exchanges. In fact most of the flowers I am about to share came from the PBS.
A favorite for it’s early blooming is a South African plant, Daubenya stylosa.
It’s bright color is an attractor for humans and it is also a magnet for slugs.
This fall I planted a few more Hyacinthoides which are striking for the blue interior flower parts.
An old reliable flower for this season is the first of our freesias to bloom.
As it turns out we have one more flower contributor for this season. The Amazon lily, which lives in the house for the cold weather, is putting out flowers.
So that about wraps it up for this Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day. Here are the newly planted seeds and bulbs from the PBS that will show up on this blog in the future.
And outside the closest we come to flowering are the big fat buds on the camellia which asks only for mid-winter thaw…
I’m not familiar with hoop petticoat daffodils, but they sure are pretty. I looked them up online, and the bulbs look pretty hard to get, at least in the US.
Brent and Beckys has nice set of the little Narcissus cantabricus, but it’s also a good reason to join the PBS.
Happy GBBD! Would you believe that I live in Spain and I have never seen those narcissus here before? For some reason, we do not appreciate our native species and garden centers don’t sell any of these varieties. Both gladiolus italicus and allium sphaerocephalon are also native to the Iberian peninsula, and I have had to order them from the Netherlands. Ridiculous.
Thank you for promoting our native flora! Hopefully, the garden centers will start taking notice (or should I start a mail-order venture?).
I would love to visit Spain on a wildflower tour. You have ground orchids that we can only dream about!
Beautiful blooms! Love the Daffodils!