Singing the blues
This month Frank finds himself counting down to the spring equinox, not in days and hours but in small blue flowers
Columnist Frank Ronan considers forming a Society for the Preservation of Small Blue Things
It is a time for small blue things. No good will be had from looking at the sky to guess what will happen next, or at nude branches to wonder how long until decency. We are counting to the equinox, not in days but in ridiculously undersized flowers. Some think it is all about yellow now, and yellow is indeed blazing everywhere to keep the majority distracted. You and I are focused on blue delicacies in between the brazen. In another month, there will be forget-me-nots and bluebells and then blue will be old hat. We awkward squad did yellow last month, smug in our aconites, and next month we may be lauding white (stitchwort, or whatever no one else is taking the trouble to notice).
Scilla siberica won’t be with us in quantity for another few weeks, but stray heralds appear at random throughout March, in some ways more exciting that the actual event. Being a good, solid blue, set off on wine-dark stems, it can make a presence felt in small quantities. S. bithynica is more washed out, almost white sometimes, but comes earlier and in rollicking quantities and so can be forgiven for being spare in pigment. It is one of those plants that people say should be better known and more easily available, but might be less lovable if it were. All the populations I know have nice provenances – you got it from Laura who got it from Pip who got it from Christo who got it from Cherry. The genealogy adds a charm necessary to a plant of such ebullience.
Other squills are more available, and it might be worth trying a few to see what likes you most. I did so with S. bifolia once and was less astonished by its early demise once I spotted the alpine in the vernacular title. Next on my to-do list are the hybrids made between Scilla and the related Chionodoxa (which you can’t help thinking should have been named Charybdis with that in mind – have you ever actually seen it glorifying a snowmound?). The x Chionoscilla, as they have, with even less imagination, been named, are reputed to have a vigour that might make them more likely to survive here than either parent. There was a time when you could get named varieties, but I don’t know where you’d track them down now. We need a Society for the Preservation of Small Blue Things.
Omphalodes cappadocica, being in with the borages, is a very good blue, and the one I look forward to most. Up here it appears in March, just, in a good year. The flowers are borne over leaves of a clear green and look best if allowed to drip over an edge. The good form is ‘Cherry Ingram’ (he from whom the S. bithynica began in our genealogies). If you crave novelty, there is also something called ‘Starry Eyes’, which is fun, but not to be mourned when it doesn’t stay with you. The ‘Cherry Ingram’ form stays and is an unbelievable blue every year.
Other little blues are easily overlooked: Muscari, because when they are successful they are too easy, but they will thrive in difficult places and on neglect, and a potful for the house reminds you how good the scent is; Pulmonaria, because we think of coarse soldiers and sailors and forget that the soldiers can be eliminated in the best forms – ‘Blue Ensign’ for some, ‘Munstead Blue’ for me; and reticulate irises, because they can’t deal with the hurly-burly of the border and really need to be kept in pots, unlike the obliging woodlanders.
As the month closes, the blues expand. Blue anemones and blue kinds of Clematis alpina appear, but by then the riot will have begun and flowers will need to be larger to be seen at all. Now, while those leaves that have so far appeared are small and few against the brown earth, a single pinprick of good blue can make your day and bring a garden to life.
WE NEED A SOCIETY FOR THE PRESERVATION OF SMALL BLUE THINGS. A SINGLE PINPRICK OF GOOD BLUE CAN MAKE YOUR DAY AND BRING A GARDEN TO LIFE