What colour are bluebells?

[alan refail]

No, this is not a trick question.

We have bluebells in many places in our gardens and field. I have always known that a few white or pink flowers could appear. Over the last few years I have been seeing more and more white flowered ones. This year, in certain places almost half are coming up white, most of which were definitely blue last year. I am beginning to notice more white flowers than usual in the hedgerow bluebells which are numerous round this area. By the way, these are all wild bluebells (Hyacynthoides non-scripta) and not Spanish bluebells escaped from gardens.

Any ideas what's going on?

Alan

[madasafish]

Our garden has a lot (1000s) of bluebells and as you rightly remark - a few pink ones: they are I suspect a sport and only occur in th southfacing section. We have a large clump of white which we - iirc- purchased 15 ish years ago.

[Jenny Green]

No idea at all. But I do know they're purple, not blue!
It bugs me how horticulturalists refer to purple plants as blue, and in garden centres the labels often depict the flowers of purple plants as blue. It's very misleading for new gardeners and just plain annoying when reading about a new plant, because without actually seeing its flowers in real life you've no idea whether they really are blue or not.
Rant over!

[Granny]

We've got a big garden with hundreds of bluebells which are wild. I've not noticed more white or pink ones this yesr so far, but we've always had some. I just assumed the different colours were rogue ones. We've also got some pink forget-me-nots in amongst the normal ones, and they're wild as well. I'm interested to know if there's a particular reason for the different colours.
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Granny

[oldherbaceous]

Are you sure you are not all going colour-blind.

[alan refail]

Jenny

Our blue ones are more blue than purple.
If you're bothered about colour words try this:

The Welsh word for blue is glas.
It also used to be the word for green (presumably before people got so picky about such things). It often appears in placenames, when it still always means green and not blue.

OH

I'm not colour blind - is it global whitening?

All

I would appreciate any other reports of an increase in white bluebells.

Alan

[richard p]

ours are blue!!! except for an odd white one, no more than in the past though

[Jenny Green]

Okay. You are all colour blind.
This is not blue:



This is blue:

[oldherbaceous]

Dear Jenny they both look blue to me.

Now theres a thought Alan, global whitening, i must admit i did see a clump of whitebells yesterday.

[Jenny Green]

Further evidence for the prosecution.
I've just taken these photos in my garden.

Clematis Frances Rivis, advertised as blue



Variegated periwinkle, advertised as blue



Contrast these with forget me nots



and can't remember the name of this one, something cappadocia I think



Can you see what I mean?

[oldherbaceous]

Dear Jenny, yes i can see exactly what you mean.
Anything for a quite life.

[alan refail]

Well, to my old Welsh eye, they're all green (see my last post).

Any chance of getting back to white purplebells

[alan refail]

Here's what I was asking about



Alan

[Jenny Green]

Oh Herby, you are no fun at all!

Alan, I think white and pink are natural variations of bluebells.

[Jenny Green]

Maybe it's something to do with global warming?