Get ready for their grand entrance

COLCHICUMS are dramatic and colourful plants to brighten up our gardens at the end of the season, with a freshness that is more spring-like than autumnal. You see them in garden centres from the end of July onwards —large lumpy corms with white flesh revealed beneath the crackling brown skin (technically, a membranous tunic). The flowers start to emerge from August to October and will do so even if the corm has not been planted. Sometimes, you see naked, unsold bulbs already flowering rather pathetically in their various shades of pink or pale purple.

Everyone starts by thinking these gorgeous creatures, but it is not easy to cultivate well.