Desert Tulip

Definitely not desert weather here again today.   Mild, out of the wind but plenty of cloud and sometimes wet.  Meg got a run as we met our friends this morning before I took charge of Bella while Jamie was in Aberystwyth.   I packed for Birmingham and after lunch welcomed a friend from singing who also shares an interest in alpine plants.  A happy hour and a bit.   Then it was all systems go, picking up my Mum, dropping off Bella and away to Ruth's, arriving just after dark.  A couple of days of family time.

Tulipa systola, the Desert Tulip.  Native in Eastern Turkey and through to Israel and Western Iran, growing in dry, rocky places.   My plant a sole survivor from a few seeds sown five years ago, flowering for the first time.   It's very dwarf, the flower large but held very close to the ground.  A beauty.