“Here tulips bloom as they are told; Unkempt about those hedges blows, an English unofficial rose”

Grantchester – Rupert Brooke

---

About Tulips

Tulips are categorised into sixteen divisions. However our society, which has a long tradition of growing English Florists’ Tulips, generally place tulips into three broad groups:

• English Florist Tulips
• Dutch Tulips
• Species Tulips

It might be said that with sixteen divisions why do we have our own groups? The simple reason is that our society has been growing and showing English Florist Tulips for almost two hundred years, and what we now refer to as Dutch Tulips came later. There is also a practical aspect, which is that our shows are held when the English Florist Tulips are in bloom, and this tends to occur much later than many ‘Dutch’ varieties.

English Florist Tulips

Breeders, Flames and Feathers

These are the tulips almost unique to our society. English Florist Tulips are distinguished by flamed and feather markings caused by Tulip Breaking Virus. They fit into the Rembrandt Division

Dutch Tulips

This is a very broad category, encompassing most of the divisions. It includes but is definitely not limited to the Lily-flowered, Fringed and Parrot divisions.

Species Tulips

The Species Tulip or Wild Tulip, sometimes called the Botanical Tulip, is an amazingly diverse group found growing in the wild areas of Europe and Central Asia. In this category there are the Kaufmanniana, Fosteriana, Greigii and Species divisions.