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Artful Living: Little-known lily variety enlivens gardens

Linda Brazill
Special to the Capital Times  —  8/24/2008 12:35 pm

Among the stars of my June garden are lilies. They're elegantly graceful, hardy to Zone 3 (northern Wisconsin), pest-free and grow in the shade. What more could a flower want?

Perhaps a little respect.

These are martagon lilies -- a wonderful plant that continues to remain relatively unknown despite having been cultivated for centuries. John Gerard, author of the famous Elizabethan botanical guide "Herbal," mentions them in a list of the plants growing in his garden -- in 1596.

Martagons come up early in the garden. By Mother's Day, mine were all a good 2 feet tall, and most of them will be nearly double that size when they bloom in the next few days. The plant's glossy foliage rises in whorls along the sturdy stems and adds a distinctive shape to the garden while you wait for the flowers.

One stem may carry dozens of downward-facing "Turk's Cap"-type flowers, which come in a wide range of pinks, mauves, and scarlet and wine reds, as well as white, yellow and orange. They self-seed and, unlike many lilies that fade away after a few years, martagons will outlive the gardener who plants them -- rather a nice thought.

The lagging popularity of martagons is likely due to the small size of their flowers. They simply do not have the kind of large, showy blossoms that Trumpet, Aurelian and Oriental hybrids sport, nor their intense perfume. Some people claim that martagons have an unpleasant scent, but I've never noticed it.

But while the martagon flowers are significantly smaller, they have a subtle sophistication their more dramatic relatives lack. A slight breeze will set them dancing rather than falling over. And they have the advantage of fitting into the larger garden design, unlike the big, flashy hybrids, which demand to be noticed to the detriment of the bigger picture.

Martagon seedpods are just as attractive as the flowers, and I always leave mine in place for winter interest -- a habit that does not seem to sap the plants' vigor. The seedpods are also good markers, so I don't go digging in the wrong spot when I'm adding bulbs in the fall or mucking around in the spring.

Perhaps the real reason martagons have not achieved the same degree of popularity is the cost of the bulbs. Look in any catalog that sells martagons and you'll see what I mean.

Regardless of the price, I can't imagine my garden without the red lacquered flowers of varieties like "Claude Shride" or "Mrs. R. O. Backhouse," which Old House Gardens describes as "soft amber-gold touched with pink and dotted with maroon."

These days I'm hunting for the most interesting martagons out there, which is how I discovered the Web site for Lily Nook. Every martagon lily that caught my fancy on the Web was from a Canadian grower, but Lily Nook was one of the few Canadian sources that ships to the U.S. At last look, they had about a dozen different martagons for sale, with prices ranging from $10 to $50 per bulb in Canadian dollars.

Lily Nook's site notes that credit card payments are automatically adjusted for exchange rate. There's also a $10 Phytosanitary Certificate charge per order. This certificate is required by the destination country and proves the bulbs have been inspected to be sure they are free of insects and disease.

Not very romantic-sounding, but you'll be sure those mail-order packages won't contain any unpleasant surprises -- just gorgeous lilies.

Linda Brazill
Special to the Capital Times  —  8/24/2008 12:35 pm