Description
(formerly Crocus biflorus isauricus)
On the inside this has a pale blue to violet ground colour verging to white but it is not invariably white as I have seen suggested. Rarely the inner petals can be overlaid with blue-purple flecks towards the tips and in forms which have pale violet inners, this is where the pigment is most concentrated also.
The outside of the flowers is usually is powerfully stained, spickled or striped with purple on a base colour itself sometimes suffused with silvery shadows, the whole has a gold throat which is visible both inside, and outside the flower.
This has remained a very confused species since its original description based on Walter Siehe’s find in S. Turkey. Horticultural stocks have also been misidentified and other species have been offered under this name. Subsequently its identity has been clarified by Kerndorff and Pasche. Our new, confirmed stock, is traceable to Belpinar in Turkey and the flowers have the cup-shape considered typical of the true plant.
