Cyclamen graecum ssp. anatolicum Rhodes Form

Part of being a plant geek includes picking up plants that you have no business owning. This happens all on a whim, against your greater judgement. For me it tends to happen way more in the winter when I'm garden starved and nothing new has caught my eye outside. 

Sometime in late February we headed out to a witch hazel talk down at Rarefind Nursery.We ran into the Tylers who were selling a ton of Hellebores and we got to talk with them about their book. There was also a cyclamen grower there who had a ton of irresistible, adorable specimens.

I've taken care of florist's cyclamen (Cyclamen persicum) for quite awhile now. I've never had it go dormant on me either which I hear is pretty unusual. Not to mention the thing blooms every 4 months for me. With that in mind, I figured that I could probably handle one that would be a little more exotic. It is pretty big and leggy now, but considering it hasn't hit dormancy, I'm impressed.

I ended up picking Cyclamen graecum ssp. anatolicum. Edgewood gardens has some other lovely pictures.

Unfortunately this is the only picture I have of my specimen. Its the small thing in the glass terrarium. Schrodinger doesn't look too impressed either.

"Cyclamen graecum. This interesting and charming autumn-flowering species forms an entity of its own, with several characters that are unique to the genus. The species Cyclamen graecum is grown for its autumn flowers as well as for its handsome and often striking foliage, which comes in a great range of patterning and colouring. It is native to southern Greece, the Greek Islands, southern Turkey and Cyprus and blooms from September to November and has pale to deep pink flowers with 3 magenta pencil-line streaks at the base of each petal and auricles around the mouth. The tuber is globose and corky and fleshy roots come from the center underside. Cyclamen leaves change even in the same season (but also from season to season as the plant matures). Cyclamen graecum ssp. graecum is found on mainland Greece and some of the Islands. It hasovate leaves that are green or grey-green and pink flowers with well-developed auricles that are mostly unscented and marked with a basal blotch that extends along the veins. Its flowers appear above, or before the wonderfully patterned leaves." (http://www.brags.ca/forms_files/cyclamennotes.pdf)

Sounds nice huh?

This is mostly what mine has looked like since April.

One leaf.

We'll see. Maybe this will go under plants I've killed sometime soon.

I'm going to try more light. I hope that will work. I've just been very disappointed with this thing so far and considering that it should be flowering soon, its got of catching up to do.