Curcuma Sparganifolia Pink Pearl Greentop

Not just we`ve been impressed by the cute, little blossoms of Curcuma sparganifolia Pink Pearl Greentop, as there was already a crowd standing around a bucket of Curcuma sparganifolia cut-flowers.

All the people been singing from the same hymnal, Oh, what lovely, neat flowers. It`s a Curcuma plant I said and an old Thai lady smiled at me. How do You know, You`re not a Thai. I love this plants and have a few in my garden, but this one I never saw before. Same me, said the old lady, they are so cute. I took my chance and bought a bouquet of them. That was the initial spark and a few minutes later the whole bucket was sold. The saleswoman smiled and said, thank You so much, this will be a great day as it was my first sale today and now all the flowers are sold out. At first view it looked like we found a new Curcuma hybrid, so we`ve been quite surprised as we found out that it is a species plant. Curcuma sparganifolia Gagnep. 1903 is native to Cambodia and Thailand, blossoms look similar to Curcuma alismatifolia, but are much smaller. Plants reach heights of about 60 cm, blossoms get a length of just about 4-6 cm.

Curcuma sparganifolia requires a warm to hot tropical climate, a shaddy location and a consistently moist soil. The tropical plant is suitable to be cultivated in containers, but isn`t hardy. Curcuma plants, commonly called Thai Tulips or Siam Tulips, are dormant most time of the year. They sprout by the end of the tropical hot season in May – June and start to flower by the beginning of the rainy season in July – August. Latest in September – October the tropical plant dies back except for the rhizome, to delight us again with its natural beauty in the next year. Curcuma sparganifolia Pink Pearl Greentop cut-flowers last for about 5 days - one week.