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| Allium caeruleum Heacock form |
Unless your name happens to be Mark McDonough, alliums are a bit of a hard sell. Like sedums, violets (and Gaul for that matter), onions can be divided into three parts: the quietly functional ones (
A. cepa, or
A. schonoprassum for instance--which we eat). Then there are the infinitely desirable rosulate violets, or fussy desert onions which are slow or challenging in the extreme--and finally there are the onions that seek to conquer every square inch of your garden--the ones to avoid at all cost...and then there is
Allium caeruleum, which is sold by Dutch nurseries, and disappoints. But THIS
Allium caeruleum is a beat of a different quality altogether: I was given bulbs of this 30 some years ago by Mary Ann Heacock...who obtained them from a correspondent in Southeastern Europe. They are almost twice the size of typical
caeruleum, and possess much more substance. Alas, they are not available commercially, although several Colorado nurseries have been growing them. Because alliums are regarded as bulbs, however, these are essentially doomed in commerce--because they are not being grown commercially in Holland.
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| Allium caeruleum Heacock form at DBG Rock Alpine Garden |
Above you can see the spot where they were first planted some 30 years ago: the display slows down after a decade or so but every time we renovate this bed, the alliums come back with a vengeance. You can get them to bloom heavily, we have found, but fertilizing and growing them like a perennial results in a good show year after year...they have been under observation by a certain Plant Introduction whose initials are "P.S."--but the committees thus far don't seem to be too impressed, and I'm afraid they fall through the cracks...
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| Allium caeruleum Heacock form |
Maybe they will be hampered by the obvious common name, if you know what I mean...
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| Allium caeruleum Heacock form in Plant Select garden |
There are in enough local gardens they are not apt to disappear...I took the picture above just a day or two ago....
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| Allium altaicum |
Another failure of the trials was this wonderful swollen leafed allium from Central Asia--which didn't attract quite the appeal necessary to get it into the program. I find that it attracts a great deal of curiosity and hope that we reconsider one day. I grow a few dozen of them in a wide spectrum of soils and exposure: they grow and look awesome everywhere...what more does one need?
I suppose I could go for a few more rosulate violets!
