Eucomis: I blame the children.

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Don’t get me wrong I love both my girls, but they do exert influences in what grows in my garden long after they have grown up and moved out. Though Victoria came back thanks to Coronavirus and due to her specialism in moths and butterflies I have grown many more British natives than I would normally do. [Weeds to most people!] She is the reason I have Clematis ‘Victoria’ a lovely purple with magenta bar, flower growing through Rosa ‘New Dawn’; and an old rose cultivar ‘La Reine Victoria’. Elizabeth is also represented by Clematis montana ‘Elizabeth’ and Rosa ‘Queen Elizabeth’.

However, over the years, I have gained plants some very welcome others that I wouldn’t normally choose. A variety of crocus and daffodil bulbs welcomed as birthday presents but also Allium moly, yes welcomed initially as I like yellow and once duly planted a nightmare to de-establish. Mother’s Day gifts of primroses, hellebores, ferns all accepted as I knew they were bought with love. As they got older and were less influenced by their dad their choices became a little more eclectic.
A packet duly appeared, held up by two smiling faces. ‘We both really like these mum. Can we plant them?’ I tried hard and smiled, ‘yes of course, lets put them into pots’. Husband raised an eyebrow, knowing that was my code for ‘not keen as I don’t know where they will go and not sure if I like them’ but in they went and I let Nature do its thing. The packet contained 2 bulbs of Eucomis bicolor and it took me a while to explain and convince the girls that they were called Pineapple lilies because they looked like the foliage of a pineapple but they couldn’t eat them.

Eucomos bicolor

What a surprise awaited me, I liked them and various sources said they were hardy/ half hardy/ tender so into the greenhouse the pot went to overwinter: just in case
Next season there were 3 flowers and the pot soon became full so I decided to plant some out in a sheltered part of the garden. They survived there for a good 6 years until the really harsh winter of 2011. In 2015 I was presented with E. autumnalis for my birthday; a white flower and the foliage has a wavy edge. Some went in the garden others into pots to keep the E. bicolor company.

Eucomis autumnalis

I then looked into some of their history. The plant was introduced into Europe in the early 1700’s and they were growing in the Oxford Botanic Garden in 1732 when a German botanist Johann Jacob Dillenius gave a Latin description of the plant. Later in the century they were reclassified as Eucomis by the French botanist L’Heritier. Eucomis – eu meaning good/pleasing and kome meaning hair or tuft, referring to the tuft of leaves that give the plant its common name.
It belongs in the family Asparagaceae, though some classifications put it in the Hyacinthaceae and the RHS designate it as tender/borderline hardy. The genus is also divided into diploid species, having 30 chromosomes and tetraploid species having 60 chromosomes.

They come mainly from regions of South Africa with high summer rainfall and winter dormancy providing it is cool and dry. As long as they have winter dryness, they do well for me here. I have tended to bury the bulbs almost twice as deep than the packets suggest and they continue to survive.

Since the first gifts of E. bicolor and E. autumnalis the girls have added to my collection of pots with E. comosa and another with the label Eucomis ‘Aloha nani’. This later one is one of many hybrids which have been bred In America for their pot plant trade.

Eucomis comosa

Eucomos Aloha nani

Do I blame my children for adding to the pots on the pond wall? Yes of course I do but I do forgive them. It could have been worse eg Agapanthus.

Oh hang on they have bought me those too.

• 27 Aug, 2021
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