FALLING FOR FRITILLARIES
These exotic blooms are surprisingly easy to grow
Buy fritillary bulbs early and from a good supplier
The fritillaria family is delightfully diverse. If you haven’t discovered them yet, hesitate no more – there is a variety suitable for just about every location. With their pendant bell-shaped flowers and lily-like leaves (they are related to lilies), they range in height from less than 10cm to more than a metre and, while some are rare and tricky to grow, all the fritillaries featured here are categorised as ‘easy’. A pot on an outdoor windowsill or tabletop can be home to the smallest and most delicate varieties, including Fritillaria hermonis, F. michailovskyi and our much-loved native snake’s head fritillary, F. meleagris. These diminutive beauties, flowering from mid-spring onwards, are all deserving of close inspection. The snake’s head fritillary, being our one true British native, will also naturalise readily, given the right conditions.
Their larger relatives prefer to be planted in the border, where their striking appearance is a
great addition to a late-spring display. The small plum-purple flowers of F. persica ‘Adiyaman’ dangle from a tall, elegant stem and open progressively over several weeks from early to late spring, while the broad leaves and buttery-yellow bells of the Siberian fritillary F. pallidiflora appear in April and May – although this variety does need to be grown in soil that remains damp all year. The metre-high crown imperials F. imperialis are impossible to miss, with their ring of ‘look-at-me’ flowers in shades of orange or yellow sprouting a mad topknot of leaves. They add drama (and a foxy smell) to the garden from mid- to late-spring.
Fritillaries are usually bought towards the end of summer as dormant bulbs, but an increasing number of nurseries and garden centres are selling ready grown plants in spring and this is an easy (if more expensive) way of trying them out in your garden. If they establish well, you can then bulk them up with dry bulbs. Depending on scarcity, these can range from a few pence each (snake’s head)
to an eye-watering £30 a bulb for F. ayakoana,a rare collector’s item that’s definitely not for garden cultivation. Fortunately, there are plenty of easy-togrow fritillaries that are more reasonably priced.
According to specialist nursery Kevock Plants (which includes more than 50 varieties in its catalogue), the fritillary family is almost endless and thrives in a correspondingly diverse range of habitats. Many need a dry spell in summer and, for this reason, are most easily grown in pots of gritty soil that can be allowed to dry off after the foliage has died down. The bulbs should then be re-potted in late summer and given a really good watering – what Kevock Plants refers to as the ‘September thunderstorm treatment’. Other fritillaries, including F. camschatcensis, F. persica and F. graeca will grow perfectly happily in the garden in soil enriched with leaf mould and grit, although they won’t do well in clay soil.
Traditionally, it was advised that crown imperials should be planted on their side to avoid water collecting in the large hole at the top of the bulb, but this is no longer considered necessary as it was discovered that within a year the bulb rights itself. Like all fritillaries, they hate root disturbance when they are in active growth, so be sure to plant them somewhere where you don’t routinely disturb the soil. Fortunately, hardiness is not generally a problem with garden-worthy fritillaries, although a mulch of leaves or bracken will give them some additional winter protection – remember to remove the mulch as soon as the plants come in to growth to avoid slug damage.
To see them in all their glory, it is well worth visiting one of the sites where snake’s head fritillaries still survive in the wild, or one of the gardens where they have established good colonies. Visit fritillaria.org.uk for a list – it could be the start of a magnificent obsession.