Keyed Out #124 — Crocosmia × crocosmiiflora 'Lucifer'

Question 1

Six coloured {tepals} spread above an {ovary} set below the flower, and inside stand just three {stamens}, not the six a showy {monocot} usually offers.

Accepted Answer

iris family

Question 2

Every blade is folded down its midline and straddles the one inside it, so the {equitant} fan lies in a single plane with no upper or lower face, and each flower emerges from a pair of dry {spathe} sheaths.

Accepted Answer

Iridaceae

Question 3

Lift the clump and the underground storage organs come up as a connected vertical stack, this year's sitting on last year's and the chain parting easily between links, rather than as a single organ renewed each season with a ring of {cormlets} round its base.

Accepted Answer

Crocosmia

Question 4

Pick the flowers, dry them, then steep them in warm water: what rises is the smell of saffron, the observation that supplied the first half of this plant's genus name.

Accepted Answer

Crocosmia

Question 5

Each bloom is a curved funnel widening from a narrow base and held outward to upward along the branch, not a nearly regular six-pointed star on a short tube, nodding from its stalk.

Accepted Answer

Crocosmia × crocosmiiflora

Question 6

Its sword blades are barely 0.4 to 0.8 inch (1 to 2 cm) across and merely ribbed, never the broad lance-shaped leaves thrown into deep {plicate} pleats.

Accepted Answer

Crocosmia × crocosmiiflora