We’ve made several hellebore posts, which are hard not to do, since they put on such a great winter show in the shade garden. Here are some of our selections of the fertile Helleborus x hybridus from the garden this week. If you made it to our winter open house, you were able to see these in person. If not, this is the best we can do until next winter, when we hope you’ll add us to your travel calendar.

Helleborus x hybridus is a mixed group from a wide range of parents including Helleborus orientalis, viridis, atrorubens, purpurescens, torquatus, and probably others. The flower color of each seedling varies based on what other colored hellebore is growing nearby in combination with the genes of it’s past lineages. In the wild, most flowers from the hellebore species listed above are pendulous, since upright or outright flowers often doesn’t bode well for successful fruit set in snowy winter climates. Through the years, breeders have made incredible progress raising the faces of the flowers, and in other cases simply colorizing the petal exterior on drooping forms. We salute the amazing hellebore breeders who keep pushing the limits of what we thought possible.