Arisaema

Arisaema album

This species makes 30-45cm stems bearing trifoliate leaves. In June you can expect flowers and these consist of rich emerald-green, hooded spathes which tone to white in the centre, both from the top and the sides. It is from the resulting large central white patch that the name 'album' derives.

The spadix is not the usual club-shape but is, instead, divided into a very unusual and distinctive bristly or feathery brush. This alone sets it aside from almost all other species and lends a lovely appearance.

Little known in cultivation but apparently common in its increasingly rare habitat in the Khasia Hills of NE India, which is being logged away.

Arisaema amurense

A superb garden species from Manchuria with tri-part, crisped edge leaves and an emerald green spathe broadly lined with white.

Readily grown in almost any garden soil, best in humus enriched loam in light shade, but tolerant. One of the most northerly species and thus very hardy.

Arisaema aridum

This has a short, quite fat, green tube that is finely marked with pencil-thin lines of paler green. From the mouth of the very "open" spathe a long thin deep-green spadix winds skywards, describing a perfect semi-circle, as it twists back on itself.

Easily grown and remarkably attractive for a plant that is basically all-green in colour !

Arisaema asperatum

One of the smaller species, without being dwarf, this has brown, green, olive and white striped spathes with a widely flaring, wavy-edged lid over the spathe and a winding, slightly spiralled spadix in green and white.

Remarkably attractive for such a sombre sounding colour-scheme and readily grown and perennating in well-drained, humus rich soils in light shade.

Arisaema auriculatum

(syn hungyaense)

A fascinating dwarf species with olive spathes, spotted purple at the base. The lid of the spathe consists of two greatly elongated lobes which stick out sideways to the rest.

These ears are slightly darker, and look like the ears of a flying helmet. I cannot look at this plant without a smile and it has a character and humour all of its own.

Light leafy humid shade. This species naturally makes VERY small tubers. I stress this, as they will shock you but at only 1cm across and weighing just 3gm ours are fully flowering sized.

Arisaema barnesii

This is about 40cm tall and bears a single umbrella-leaf made up of 5-9 broad, strongly veined leaflets.

The spathe tube is green, heavily overlaid with purple and striped with white with the lid similarly marked.

The spathe is brown-purple and white striped and drawn out into a long, slender tail which terminates in a small lump. The spadix is deep purple and green and protrudes from the mouth.

A very attractive, newly available species these are of horticultural origins but it is recorded as occurring in the edges of mountains rainforests in southern India.

Arisaema bathycoleum

Quite a small species, (though one with a reasonable sized tuber). with a waxy, plain green three-part leaf in which the leaflets are tidily held together.

Below, or level with, the leaves is a jade green spathe which is striped with colourless, translucent stripes. The effect is very attractive, especially when combined with the yellow spadix which protrudes slightly beyond the mouth.

Hardy and easy outside but good for a pot also. Small growing but a species notable for not making a small tuber.

Arisaema brevipes purple

This high altitude Chinese species has a powerfully striped spathe of purple (in this form) and white folded over and down into a hood which itself is extended at the tip into a long whiskery filament that hangs down.

The contrast between purple and white is especially good and growth here has been excellent out in the garden. This is not the oxblood-red form offered in the past.

Arisaema candidissimum

These are propagated from a cultivated stock imported from China many, many years ago and grown on in cultivation.

Strong healthy plants showing some slight variation in flower colour from pale to mid pink with pale green and white striping and all are fragrant. The strain sets seed freely, as they are not clonal.

The species grows well in a well-drained, fertile, garden soil in full sun (or light shade). It appears above ground very late in the season, often June or even July. This is normal. It also means that they are available later in the spring than many other species.

Arisaema candidissimum Forrest clone

This is the old George Forrest stock introduced over 90 years ago from China and a good, garden plant reliably making pale, whitish-pink flowers in June as it comes through the ground. These are faintly but pleasantly fragrant.

The inflorescence sits above, glossy, three part leaves which sets it off beautifully.

Tolerates a wide range of garden soils in sun or light shade, the more fertile the soil, so the better and larger that the plant becomes.

Arisaema candidissimum White

The pink colouration in this form, though still present, is reduced to a minimum - giving a lovely spathe of almost pure white with just enough subtly-infused pink pigmentation to be gentler on the eye. The white is not absolute - such a plant does not exist - but the pink is minimal and confined to infusions concentrated around the veins.

Delightfully fragrant, as is this species and a very attractive plant. Easy in the garden and sharing the very late appearance of the pick form, seldom before June.

Arisaema candidissimum Yellow

This is a new plant which we have been trying to obtain for some years, since we heard that it existed. At last we have them!

The photographs that we have seen (for we have yet to flower it) show what is clearly a pale yellow-flowered candidissimum and the leaves are of the candidissimum type. The tubers are the same smooth, slightly rounded, angular pink tubers of the typical plant. We will, of course, be growing our stock on, but in the meantime they are a little cheaper this season. Please do not expect anything of the colour of flavum, the yellow colour is much more subdued and pale and in some cases it even looks white until compared to a truly white plant.

Arisaema clavatum

The two leaves in this species are each divided up into between eight and eleven leaflets which sit alongside the inflorescence.

The spathe is large for the size of the plant, the central third is greenish-white but the remaining two thirds is a deep, rich purple-brown striped with white.

In the centre of the spathe, and in perfect contrast to the white stripes, sits a deep purple-brown Indian-club spadix, this ‘clavate’ shape gives the plant its Latin name.

Not often seen or available but this is easy in standard Arisaema conditions, out in the garden.

Arisaema concinnum

This has pink-tinged stems of 20-25cm in height, which carry a wonderfully symmetrical, whorled Chinese Umbrella of leaves with the flower spathes.

The spathe is of pale fawn and lime-green, striped in white as well as with darker purple-brown towards the mouth. The tip of the spathe lid is drawn out into a long whisker that hangs down.

Easily grown outside and we keep it in the ground all year (and for year after year). Northern India.

Arisaema consanguineum

Tall snakeskin mottled stems topped by a nearly circular parasol of leaflets. Each leaflet is elongated into a whiskery “drip-tip” that diverts water from the stem of the plant.

The spathe is equally elongated and highly decorative in shàdes of steel-grey, purple and brown.

Easy in the garden and a very striking and stately plant with an "architectural" appeal.