Daffodils: classic vs modern
When it comes to choosing narcissi, do you like to keep it traditional or opt for more recent introductions? Both types have their merits, as Graham Rice explains…
THE RHS lists almost 8,000 different daffodil varieties in its records. Eight thousand! It’s true, not all of them are still available from the bulb nurseries, but almost 2,000 are – and that’s a lot of daffs to choose from.
Of course, you may have a very clear idea of what kind of daffodil you’re looking for, but one aspect that’s not always considered is this: is it better to choose the old tried and tested varieties, or plump for those that have been introduced more recently? You can certainly depend on the old favourites, but how about something more modern?
First, let’s decide what we mean by ‘modern’. Daffodils take a long time to build up from one original bulb of a new variety to the hundreds or thousands needed for them to be offered for sale. It’s not like a Michaelmas daisy, say, where one plant will yield dozens of spring cuttings that can be grown on to be sold later the same year. Daffodils bulk up far, far more slowly; it can take decades. So I would say that anything introduced in the past 50 years qualifies for the term ‘modern’.
Some of the old favourites are still amongst the best of all daffs, especially those that have been awarded the RHS Award of Garden Merit. The likes of ‘Carlton’, with its bold yellow trumpets, and the oddly named ‘Geranium’, with clusters of orange-eyed white flowers, certainly take some beating.
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Long-established varieties also tend to be cheaper than newcomers and easier to find – you can pick them up from petrol stations, small supermarkets and market stalls. But they can be a little limited in their styles and colours; they’re also the same ones that are in everyone else’s gardens, and are more likely to be infected with hidden virus diseases, which may limit flower production.
Modern varieties, on the other hand, come in a much wider variety of different flower forms and different colours and colour combinations – some entirely unexpected. For proof, look no further than ‘Cum Laude’, with its frilly peach trumpets flattened against white petals.
Newer daffs are usually more reliably vigorous than traditional kinds, and tend to be virus-free. But they can be more expensive and available only by mail order from specialist suppliers.
Me? I grow a mix of classic favourites and modern introductions – that way, I can ensure that I’m getting the best of both worlds.