It feels like a very special treat when the hellebores start to flower. I don’t have many in my own garden yet, so I enjoy seeing them in other people’s gardens and wherever they’re offered for sale .
Recently I treated myself to a couple of new hellebores. According to the labels, they are ‘Shooting Star’ and ‘Cinnamon Snow’, but they are so like each other that it’s hard to be sure if they are actually different. (Plant labels can easily get mixed up in garden centres!)
As far as I can tell, the ‘Shooting Star’ is very close to white, with a touch of pink and yellowy-green to the flower as it ages. In the photo above, these tints are more pronounced because the bright studio lights make the colours of the reverse of the flower show through its slightly translucent petals.
‘Cinnamon Snow’ is a little darker, with a peachy-pink blush to its creamy flowers. It’s interesting to watch the flowers darken and develop more of a green colouring as time passes.
The flowers on these plants are a bit more upright than most hellebores, which makes their pretty faces much easier to see in the garden. (Usually I find I have to turn the flowers of hellebores upwards to see what they look like, so their beauty can go unseen if there isn’t time to stop by them for a while.)
I’m looking forward to watching these plants settle into the garden and bring a little bit of sheer loveliness to late winter.
Ann Mackay: Inspired by Nature 
I like them too – these have a wonderful, pearly quality.
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They’re so lovely that I’d like to grow more, but they are very expensive here. Luckily there’s a little nursery/garden centre nearby that has very affordable prices so I buy them there if I can – a special treat for me and the garden! 🙂
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That is an exquisite flower, Ann! Lovely pictures!
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Thank you Indira! I don’t think I could ever get tired of hellebores – and I have a couple of tiny ones in the garden that are just coming into flower. Hopefully the flowers will survive the stormy weather so that I can photograph them too… 🙂
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We have four different types, and they are prolific self seeders, especially the lime green one! So hopefully your collection will expand. 🙂
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I’d like that very much…must look out for seedlings! 🙂
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I just found out one reason I’ve not come across hellebores — they aren’t recommended for my gardening zone (9a). They’ll apparently do all right north of Houston, in 8b, but down here gardeners tend toward tropicals. They certainy are pretty things — I can see why you’d like more!
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Yes, I can’t imagine hellebores in a region that tends towards the tropical! I guess every region has its own special flowers. 🙂
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Beautiful flowers! I love the way they are arranged in the vase and the way you lit them. Do the flowers last long?
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Thanks Syd! The flowers lasted well – much better than I expected. I’d read that hellebores often don’t last more than a few hours or a day but these still look good a week later. (They have now turned a pale green and the stamens have all dropped.)
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They certainly photograph well. I have a pink one which was a house warming gift from a friend 14 years ago, and still thriving. Enjoy yours when you get them planted.
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That’s a lovely housewarming gift. 🙂 They do seem to be great survivors! I may have to hold off on planting these into the borders because we’re having our fences renewed in May. So a lot of plants may end up in pots for a while!
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They are beautiful flowers. I really like your high key flower portraits, Ann.
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Thank you Steve! I’ve got a little area set up to do them now and it really helps to be able to photograph flowers inside where they can’t blow around in the wind. 🙂
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Yes, wind is a flower photographer’s bane. 🙂
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Too true! I had great problems with the photos for my next post – poor little irises were really being blown by the breeze. You just have to hope for a moment when the wind dies down a bit.
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Shooting star indeed! How beautiful. Thank you for teaching me about flowers, Ann. I pay attention so much more to them now because of you and Ali over at Mindful Gardener.
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Thanks for the lovely comment, Shelly! I enjoy sharing the flowers I photograph. And I enjoy Ali’s blog too. 🙂
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Your blogs are both so lovely.
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Thank you! 🙂
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