Aquilegia, European Columbine, European Crowsfoot, Granny's Bonnets 'Pom Pom Mixed'

These Pom Pom forms are known to have occured in Victorian times and were almost lost to cultivation during the mid 20th century.
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Can bear up to 16 tiers of petals (possibly more) and while double and treble forms are relatively common in A. vulgaris, to be a Pom Pom type they must bear many more tiers. The flowers that occur in the garden here, tend to have around 7 to 12 tiers or petals, more usually 9. As the flower matures, it becomes more outward facing.

I bought the first Pom Pom a number of years ago, it flowered once and died, since then we've had a number of Pom Pom types occur, they seem to regularly cross well with a rather dark purple form that has a tendancy for triple tiers. We've had colours ranging from soft pink, cerise, blue and dark purple, occasionally a white picotee occurs on the dark purple forms, other colours are known in cultivation.

They have the same growing requirements as the normal A. vulgaris, however, the seed collected from the plants tend to be sterile, just a few from a whole batch will germinate. Often the resulting seedlings will be double or triple tiers but we have several of these and while they aren't very long lived, they normally produce 1 or 2 Pom Pom types that will grow and flower every two years or so.