Daffodils, Narcissus and Jonquils
Daffodil Day, March, 29 10 to 3
Thomas Foreman Historic Home 1419 W Okmulgee
Thomas Foreman Historic Home 1419 W Okmulgee
Sponsored by Muskogee Garden Club and Three Rivers Museum
Muskogee Garden Club Oyana Wilson 918-683-5380 email oyanaw@gmail.com
There are 27,000 unique daffodil cultivars with flower
colors from white to yellow and orange. Daffodils can be cultivated and
cross-bred hundreds of ways to form delicate hybrids. Also, they can live on
abandoned homesteads for a hundred years without any human intervention.
The names Jonquil, Narcissus and Daffodil are used for all
the flowers in the Narcissus family since Narcissus is the name of the plant
genus of which they are all members. Daffodil is used as a common name for all
of them.
The exception is Narcissus jonquilla, what we call Jonquils,
are unique from the others because they have narrow leaves, and each stem has 3
fragrant flowers with flat petals.
Since early history daffodils have been celebrated in song,
poetry, literature and art.
In China paperwhite
daffodils, the Tazettas, are grown in pebbles in shallow plates so they are in
bloom for the New Year where they symbolize rebirth. The earliest time Tazettas
were used symbolically was in the tomb of Ramses II who was buried with
daffodil bulbs on his eyes.
In the Muslim Middle East they are planted on graves where
they bloom, reminding mourners of the new life to come.
In Christian Europe they symbolize the resurrection and
churches are filled with bouquets during Lent and Easter. The Austrian Narzissenfest is the largest
floral festival in that country with a daffodil queen, parade, floats and
daffodil-adorned boats on local lakes.
In Medieval Christian art, the flower is used as the symbol
of paradise, the triumph over physical death. Since 1990 daffodils were used as
a symbol of hope for cancer patients. Begun by the Marie Curie Cancer Care
charity, the daffodils for hope campaign has been adopted by the American
Cancer Society.
The Daffodils’ romantic importance was firmly etched in most
of our minds in school by Wordsworth’s 1802 poem which opens with the first
stanza: “I wandered lonely as a Cloud,
That floats on high o’er Vales and Hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A
host of dancing Daffodils; Along the Lake, beneath the trees, Ten thousand
dancing in the breeze” etc.
When a single daffodil planted by itself becomes a clump,
the additional bulbs are called daughters or clones since they will be
identical to the parent bulb and flower.
When bees visit one type of daffodil flower and take that
pollen to another variety of daffodil, the seeds that result from the
cross-pollination will produce a completely new variation of the parents’
genes. Almost all the daffodils grown in gardens today are hybrids either of
human or insect breeding through cross-pollination.
Daffodils are close relatives of amaryllis, snowdrops and
clivia. What makes them different from all their relatives is their cup,
designed by nature to protect their pollen from spring rain.
The mountains of Spain, Portugal, Morocco and Algeria have
the most diverse collection of native species where the winters are long, cool,
and moist.
In the US there are daffodil festivals from OR to FL and
most states in between. A website called Daffodil Festivals and Fields has been
set up to list them all at http://daffodilfestivals.com so you can plan spring
trips to AR, ME, TX or VA, visiting daffodil events.
In OK there is one daffodil event so far: Daffodil Day at
the Thomas Foreman Historic Home in Muskogee. A Daffodil Lawn is being planned
for the OK Botanic Garden north of Tulsa.
Since Muskogee Garden Club began planting daffodils for
Daffodil Day three years ago, club members planted them at their homes and
Master Gardeners planted 100 at the gate to the new Chandler RD. community
garden.
Other groups have expressed interest in becoming part of
Daffodil Day next year.
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