Another look at tulips
I apologise for more photos of tulips but they are the stars of the garden at the moment and bring me so much pleasure.
My pot of creamy ‘Verona Design’ has been a joy for weeks now. The large, scented flowers have been amazingly resilient and get more lovely every day. I interplanted them with ‘Pink Star’ and the two look good together although ‘Pink Star’ seems small and dowdy next to its showy housemate. ‘Pink Star’ opens pink with bronze shades and should change as it ages. We will see.
‘Pretty Princess’ is starting to open more fully and make a show. Many of the bulbs have sent up several stems, which is a nice touch.
Elsewhere in the garden a large pot is planted with three tulips. ‘Slawa’ is purple with orange edges and is a sport of ‘Gavota’ and sometimes called ‘Muvota’. With it is orange, fringed tulip ‘Orange Louvre’ which is slightly taller. There is also a purple tulip in there but it is not showing yet. Will I get the purple and orange contrast I planned. Tune in next week to find out.
I also need a bit of patience with my ‘Cream Cocktail’ tulips which are still in bud. But the leaves are nice and the forget-me-nots are now large enough to make a sea of deep blue.
I have been excited to see the first blooms of Tulipa acuminata. This is probably an old hybrid but no one quite knows what it is. It is possibly the old Turkish tulip that features in Ottoman art and is very distinctive. It can definitely be traced back to 1720. I have it planted in a south-facing slope and hope it will be happy and be perennial. It grows to about 50cm high and really needs to be planted en masse though I could only afford ten bulbs!
There is an interesting article here about bulbs being presented to the Mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem İmamoğlu in 2019 and the illustration below is from that site. You can easily recognise the tulip.
Tulipa acuminata is interesting and possibly beautiful and the same is true of ‘Ice Cream’. I have resisted growing this up till this year and there is now ‘Banana Ice Cream’ with yellow inner petals. This is another that has had to share with ‘Pink Star’ in a pot and I am bemused. It is very short (20cm) so far and I don’t understand the flowers yet. The white centres are yet to grow fully. They are quite small and very odd. Hmmm. Jury’s out on this one.
The Biking Gardener 
There is no need to apologize. Some of us do not see many tulips.
Ah – but you have mariposa tulips! And I would love to be able to grow them! I did hunt for them every time I was over there and did find quite a lot in the wild – lovely.
They are not much to look at, and wild immediately after getting cut. They seem to like to grow in roadways, but then do not want to be transplanted.
I did see lots beside roads.
Oops, I meant to say that the ‘wilt’ immediately after getting cut. Yes, they seem to like the rocky debris that gets pushed off of roads. I feel badly for them as they migrate into a roadway, but when I try to dig their bulbs, I can rarely find them. If I try to dig them while their foliage is still attached, they do not survive. Well, they are prettier in the wild anyway.
Never apologize for too many tulips, for me there is not such thing. I love your thoughts on all the different varieties that you have.