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Primula ioessa



Primula ioessa is an unusual species from wet meadows in Southern Tibet.

That is a short and rather bald statement, but I have difficulty encapsulating what it means to me.
I am not a person who fills a bed with Primula. To be honest, I am happier filling a bed with my Superman pyjamas, the genus doesn't do it for me. I grew up on a thick yellow London clay and they didn't even try. Something of the obstinate child in me still says 'they don't like me, I won't like them' and so it continues.
At the stage in a young man's life when he is embarassed to admit to Superman pyjamas, I was wandering around a garden centre being vaguely dismissive of the 'common stuff' when I looked over the alpine section and spotted a Primula I didn't know. I bought it, took it home, and failed to find anything out about it. I sat it in a corner and watched is it produced a flower stem carrying the most delightful scented pale lilac flowers I could imagine. It is reasonable to say that I could have been converted to the charms of Primula if it had survived the winter.
Wrapped up in the story, like chocolate chips in a muffin, are some deeply cherished memories. I have never been able to find another plant (and I have looked) so it was a special moment when I recieved this one in a parcel. Unfortunately it had no roots at all and the leaves were already devoloping. I was unable to establish it and I have lost it again.
So I will continue the search. There are a few nurseries offering it now, following re-introduction from China. I have killed it twice and spent forty years searching for another so I can't explain my conviction that I will be able to grow it (third time lucky).
Perhaps it is the Superman pyjamas.

John Richards says:

"Differs from P.waltonii, at least in the garden, by being smaller and neater (stems to 15cm) with relatively large cowbell-shaped flowers which are usually lilac-blue or white in colour (also pinkish in the field), and which have a mealy eye.
Commonest in very wet primula-rich passes in the Tsari district of south-east tTibet, but also recorded in Bhutan and east Nepal. Very wet alpine meadows, 3,600 - 4,300m, often growing in masses.
This most delightful little plant of refined charm is pronounced 'yo-essa'..."



11th April 2010