In 2010 I made the deliberate cross using a plant of F. ariana (originally from a commercial source) and pollen from a plant of F. bucharica that I had grown from seed tracing back to a wild collection in Tajikistan.

This resulted in lots of viable seed from five pods. Four pots were sown in late September and all pots had germinated by early February 2011. They made nice little bulbs in their 1^st year (as big as other frit taxa left in their seed pots for 2 or 3 years). The bulbs were all at the bottom of their seed pots indicating they like to be planted deep.

They flowered well in 2014 with predominantly pale pink flowers but a few bulbs gave rise to pale blue flowers. One of the pots (all pink flowers) was sufficiently advanced to win the ‘6 from seed’ class when I exhibited it at the AGS Hexham show that year (see the large image above).

All my pots continued to thrive so that I had far more material than I could accommodate and I sold most of the bulbs at the AGS Bakewell show and also on eBay in 2015.

All of the bulbs that I retained turned out to be pale pink! Some buyers would have got lucky and received the pale blue ones.

During the following years my stock has been reduced to a single robust clone. Too robust - the plant is a little too tall for my liking.

However the flowers are relatively long lasting and so it remains in my collection. For now!