Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Why would someone pay hundreds of pounds for one snowdrop bulb? I think I know

What makes snowdrop mania particularly strange is that, unlike gorgeous, colourful tulip flowers, the variations between snowdrops are almost too tiny to spot

I think I’m coming down with galanthomania. It’s a rare affliction, but one that’s hard to shake, and it’s affecting more people every year. Galanthus are snowdrops, and galanthomania is a 21st-century version of that 17th-century craze for tulips which began in the Dutch golden age. At the height of the tulip mania some bulbs were selling at 3,000 or 4,000 florins, almost ten times a craftsman’s annual wage. Snowdrop bulbs aren’t there yet, but collectors spend hundreds of pounds on some rare bulbs, and seed company Thompson and Morgan broke records in 2012 by paying £725 for a single specimen. This rare flower, Galanthus woronowii ‘Elizabeth Harrison’, has yellow ovaries and yellow markings on its white petals, and was a significant increase on the previous record of £360 for a variety called ‘Green Tear’.

This week G. plicatus ‘Bryan Hewitt’, a pure white cup-shaped snowdrop grown in the Netherlands, sold for £133 on eBay and, though I didn’t bid, I felt a pang of envy. The auction site lists dozens of other single bulbs at prices that could buy you a mature tree.

There’s some logic to spending so much. A skilled horticulturalist can take one bulb and turn it into many more plants. Other galanthophiles will pay dearly for rare bulbs, even though these are not the easiest plants to establish, and the demand means constant vigilance. At Sir Harold Hillier Gardens in Hampshire, the plants are locked in alarmed greenhouses when not in flower, and displayed under guard when in bloom.

What makes snowdrop mania particularly strange is that unlike tulips, the variations between snowdrops are tricky for a layman to spot. The only really remarkable mutation is one where the ovaries and small markings on the petals are bright yellow rather than green.

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Isabel Hardman
Written by
Isabel Hardman
Isabel Hardman is assistant editor of The Spectator and author of Why We Get the Wrong Politicians. She also presents Radio 4’s Week in Westminster.

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