Crocusbank Project

Crocuses are also interesting and valuable species

A second aspect of our topic is the description of this group of cultivated and wild plants. Several features can identify species of Crocus from each other. The styles of the Crocus vary greatly from species to species. They can be dissected into three lobes or very finely dissected with numerous lobes. The character of corm tunic is another important identification feature. There are corm tunics with circular rings around the entire corm, with fibres that run parallel from top to bottom, with overlapping scales as shell, with finely or coarsely reticulate. Other characteristics that aid in the identification of species are appearance of foliage before or after flowering, number of leaves, the flower colour, and the anther colour. Based on the presence or absence of the prophyll and using the nature of the style and corm tunic features to describe the different series, Brian Mathew subdivided the genus in two subgenera: Crocus and Crociris. C. sativus is classified into subgenera Crocus , Section Crocus, Series Crocus [Mathew, B. 1982, The Crocus . A Revision of the Genus Crocus (Iridaceae). B.T. Batsford Ltd. London] .

Subgenus	Section	Series	Species
Crocus	Crocus	Verni	C. vernus, C. tommasinianus, C. kosaninii, C. etruscus, C. babytopiorum
		Scardici	C. scardicus, C pelistericus
		Versicolores	C. versicolor, C. imperati, C. malyi, C. corsicus, C. minimus, C. cambessedesii
		Longiflori	C. longiflorus, C. serotinus, C. medius, C. niveus, C. goulimyi
		Kotschyani	C. kotschyanus, C. vallicola, C. gilanicus, C. autranii, C. scharojanii, C. ochroleucus, C. karduchorum
		Crocus	C. sativus, C. cartwrightianus, C. thomasii, C. hadriaticus, C. asumaniae, C. moabiticus, C. oreocreticus, C. pallasii, C. mathewii
	Nudiscapus	Reticulati	C. reticulatus, C. sieberi, C. dalmaticus, C. robertianus, C. abantensis, C. ancyrensis, C. cvijicii, C. gargaricus, C. angustifolius, C. sieheanus, C. rujanensis, C. cancellatus, C.hermoneus
		Biflori	C. biflorus, C. chrysanthus, C. danfordiae, C. almehensis, C. cyprius, C. hartmannianus, C. aerius, C. pestalozzae, C. caspius, C. kemdorffiorum, C. paschei, C. wattiorum, C. adanensis, C. leichtlinii
		Orientales	C. alatavicus, C. korolkowii, C. michelsonii
		Flavi	C. flavus, C. olivieri, C. antalyensis, C. candidus, C. vitellinus, C. graveolens, C. hyemalis
		Aleppici	C. aleppcius, C. veneris, C. boulosii
		Carpetani	C. carpetanus, C. nevadensis
		Intertextii	C. fleischeri
		Speciosi	C. speciosus, C. pulchellus
		Laevigatae	C. laevigatus, C. toumefortii, C. boryi
Crociris			C. batanicus

Some Crocus species are cultivated as garden flowers:

C. laevigatus ‘Fontenayi'

.C. pulchellus ‘Albus', ‘Zephyr'

.C. sativus cartwrightianus ‘Albus'

.C. speciosus ‘Albus', ‘Artabir', ‘Cassiope', ‘Oxonian', ‘Aitchinsonii', ‘Conqueror'

C. chrysanthus ‘Advance', ‘Ard Schenk', ‘Audabe', ‘Blue Bird', ‘Blue Pearl', ‘Cream Beauty', ‘Dorothy', ‘E.P.Bowles', ‘Fuscotinctus', ‘Gipsy Girl', ‘Goldilocks', ‘Herald', ‘Jeannine', ‘Ladykiller', Miss Vain', ‘Prins Claus', ‘Romance', ‘Saturnus', ‘Skyline', ‘Snowbunting', ‘Sunspot', ‘Uschak Orange', ‘Zwananburg Bronze', ‘Zenith'

C. biflorus ssp. biflorus ‘Parkinsonii'

C. biflorus ssp. weldenii ‘Albus', ‘Fairy'

C. etruscus ‘Rosalind', ‘Zwanenburg'

C. flavus ssp. flavus ‘Aureus'

C. imperati ‘De Jager'

C. korolkowii ‘Kiss of Spring'

C. luteus ‘Stellaris' ( C. angustifolius x C. flavus )

C. sieberi ‘Albus', ‘Firefly', ‘Hubert Edelsten', ‘Ronald Ginns', ‘Tricolor', ‘Violet Queen'

C. tommasinianus ‘Albus', ‘Barr's Purple', ‘Lilac Beauty', ‘Pictus', ‘Roseus', ‘Ruby Giant', ‘Whitewell Purple'

C. vernus ‘Albiflorus', ‘Graecus', ‘Harlem Gem', ‘White Star', ‘Enchantress', ‘Flower Record', ‘Jeanne d'Arc', ‘Mammoth Yellow', ‘Pickwick', ‘Purpureus Grandiflorus', ‘Queen of the Blues', ‘Remembrance', ‘Vanguard', ‘Glory of Sassenheim', ‘Negroboy', ‘Paulus Potter', ‘Twinborn', ‘White Christmas'

C. versicolor ‘Picturatus'

The 1 st International Symposium on Saffron Biology and Biotechnology (Fernández & Abdulalev, 2004), held in Albacete (Spain) and organised under the auspices of the International Society For Horticultural Science (ISHS) and the UCLM, counted with the participation of one hundred researchers, technologists and businessmen from 15 countries (Spain, Iran, Mexico, India, Greece, Italy, France, Japan, Switzerland, USA, Turkey, Hungary, Denmark, Canada, and Azerbaijan). The meeting, chaired by J.A. Fernández (proposer of the present action) provided a worldwide overview of research in saffron achieved in the last decades, including basic biology, agronomy, genetics and breeding, chemistry, industrial production, pharmacognosy, pharmacology, and economics. Attention was also given to the scientific and practical problems and the challenges for saffron plant in the XXI century. One of the statements of the Working Group on Saffron Biology and Biotechnology (M04), created at this meeting inside the Section of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants of the ISHS, was to promote the creation of a Bank of Germplasm and Gene Banks in Saffron to preserve genetic biodiversity in saffron and related species (www.uclm.es/cursos/azafran/; www.actahort.org/books/650; www.actahort.org/chronica/pdf/ch4401.pdf).

The project of creation of a bank of germplasm in saffron and allies, at minor levels, has already been approved by the Spanish Government through its National Programme of Agro-Food Resources and Food Technologies (RE2004-00032-CO3) and the Regional Government of Castilla-La Mancha (Agreement between the Agricultural Council and the University of Castilla-La Mancha , Preg-05-002).