Description
This has attractive, violet flowers which are beautifully veined in a darker shade of the same colour. All of the six, quite evenly-sized, petals are veined and all fade to a pale yellow at the base, they are set around pale yellow anthers which in turn ring around an orange-yellow, trifid style which is further sub-divided just at its tips. The style usually just exceeds the length of the anthers. The species is said to be characterised by the presence of a purple-striped upper cataphyll though in my very limited experience this striping is not always that obvious and additionally, it does vary substantially according to the age of the flower (see picture).
Flowering is in October here, well before the leaves which only follow in spring.
Crocus zubovii (named for Dr. Dimitri Zubov) is an Iranian representative of the speciosus complex and it is the most easterly species of this group. So far known only from around 2,000m altitude in the Alborz mountains of northern Iran, where it grows between trees and under small shrubs. It was discovered and named by Janis Ruksans, from whom our stock originated.
In cultivation this does well and seems to present no particular problems. Certainly this is the case when it is grown in pots under alpine glass, where we keep ours, in a well-drained, loam based compost. Dry but not arid in summer.
