I think you had poor quality bulbs. I have had clusiana cynthia in my garden for a number of years. I do replant / replenish them because I also grow caladiums there in the summer. I have the species tulips on the outside edge of a circle bed. But still, I dig around and plant other things there and grow lush caladiums in deep shade all summer long. Still, mine return and are lovely. The bulbs are much larger than pea sized. I'm mooting around for something common as a shape. Everything I can think of (acron in it's pod from a live oak, wooden bead etc is variable. How about this: Make a circle with your thumb and forefinger. Overlap the thumb so the thumb joint and the top joint of the fore finger are touching. That's the approximate size of the bulbs I planted. Order from a reputable online vendor. Colorblends gives the bulb size for Lady Jane (about the same size and cynthia) as 6-7cm for Clus. Tubergen's Gem as 5-6cm these are the smallest sizes they sell. I tried my first species tulips from a big box store in a little plastic bag. They were pea sized and never grew. Here is a link that might be useful: species tulips

I just fell in love with these this season. I am wondering if anyone has any to trade. This would be to trade sometime a little later. I am not looking for any 'mixes' of them. I prefer named ones, but would consider no named ones if you had a pic of them in your garden. I would like to trade some daffs and it will be probably sometime in June b4 the foliage will be good and yellowed, and I will have the time to dig/trade. I have numerous daffs (not listed for trade on my trade list)...some named, and some with ID. I can/will provide pics (at a later date)of all that are available for trade. I have several trades of 'other' things in the works, so I am just wanting to get something started on this b4 the species tulips maybe loose their foliage and cannot be found. Here is a link to some of the No ID Daffs...some available and some not...I put the pics up there due to one big trade I am working on now. On that same forum is another post that shows pics of some of the named ones I may have available for trade too. Anyone have any? Anyone interested in starting to line out a trade? Please be sure and post here, so I can best be able to track things. Feel free to email me additionally. Sue Here is a link that might be useful: some species tulips from John Scheepers

Here is the full tree, I think the stems are probably 2 years old maybe, but I think it might have been cut back many a few times in the past because it has multiple stems coming out of the ground. So it maybe 5 or more years old. If you compare it to the many other tulip tree sedlings just feet way from this one (all in the same circumstances) then you can see the big difference. All the other seedlings in the same circumstances (all have been cut back as well) have normal seedling leaves. Only this one has the weird narrow leaves. Again, I've never seen leaves like this on any tulip tree seedling in my life. From far back the leaves almost remind me of a Southern Red Oak (Quercus falcata) :-)

Carol, unfortunately I got mine from Dianne at Collectors Nursery and she has since gone out of business. I am attempting to grow some plants from seeds from my plant but since it is surrounded by many other clematis there is no telling what the seedlings might look like and if I will get germinations. I know the seeds are viable since I have peeled the seed coats off. Here are several pictures of the flowers on the parent plant. Joy Creek has one form called Tarpley River form or something along those lines that is supposed to be a good red. I believe they are sold out but I tried accessing their website a minute ago and am having issues trying to get items to come up on my computer screen. Not sure if it is my computer or if they are updating the site or they are having website troubles. I can get to the main page but then when I click on the CL to get to the clematis listing I get a blank page. You might want to try and see if you can get there later. Dan at Brushwood sells a texensis as does Ellen at Seneca Hills Perennials but they are both sold out I believe and I am not sure how red their flowers are. You could contact either of them and see when they might have it available. Mrs. Robert Brydon was just purchased last fall from Donahues. I potted it up in a one gallon sized pot and allowed the pot to sit outside from fall until February. At that time, we were having a warm spell so I went ahead and put it in the ground. It has just recently come up and I am going to have it crawl all over a blue pacific juniper. Here it is today. It reminds me a lot of Jouinana Praecox which has been in the ground several years and is already busting up all over the place. The foliage of both of them is also similar to two plants that I am assuming are heracleifolias that I started from seed in Nov. 07 although the leaves on these two are more rounded as opposed to the pointed and more highly serrated leaves of Brydon or joiniana.