White gold

The enchanting flowers of the snowdrop are an uplifting sight in the depths of winter and, with more than 2,000 varieties available, there is enough choice to satisfy both the gardener and the galanthophile

- Written by Ursula Buchan

YOU DON'T need to be a mad-keen gardener to know about the native 'fair maids of February': those small, white flowers that bring many gardens, parks and woodland sharply into focus in the dreariest month of the year.

The common snowdrop, or Galanthus nivalis to give it its botanical name, is dear to all our hearts, if only because it seems so defiant in the face of hard frosts and snow.

Snowdrops brave horrible weather, come up year after year - for ever - and, best of all, a long-established, thickly populated stand of them in woodland looks like a thin covering of pristine snow. The fact that Galanthus nivalis is not in fact native but is naturalised in gardens and in the wild (having been introduced into Britain no earlier than the 17th century) is not sufficiently widely known to influence patriotic sentiment on the matter.

What people may not realise is that there are 19 species of Galanthus, which range in geographical distribution from the Pyrenees in the west to Iran in the east, and as far south as the countries that border the northern and eastern Mediterranean. There are more than 2,000 cultivars (cultivated garden varieties), many of which are a great deal showier than the common Galanthus nivalis. The reason for this is that snowdrops are promiscuous madams rather than fair, unsullied maids. They may look as pure as driven snow but they are happy to mix their genes with other species in the genus Galanthus, hence the enormous numbers of named garden varieties. These days, there are snowdrops with yellow ovaries, with green streaks on the outer petals (strictly speaking 'tepals') and a host of different green markings in the inner perianth.