Helleborus hybridus Double Yellow

Helleborus x hybridus Double Yellow is a unique variety with beautiful soft yellow flowers in late winter. It produces perfect double flowers, resembling water lilies. Bright and refined, it is also robust and very hardy and will enliven borders as well as the ground under shrubs, mixed borders, and pots. Easy to grow, even in heavy soil, it thrives in shade or non-scorching sun.

Originally from Greece, Turkey, and the central and eastern Caucasus, Helleborus orientalis, sometimes called Lenten Rose, is a perennial plant from the buttercup family that easily hybridizes with other species to produce many hybrids with various colours and shapes. No variety names are given to these hybrids anymore, they are distinguished by shape and colour. Oriental Hellebore is a hardy plant that tolerates temperatures as low as -15°C (5°F), naturally growing in forests, thickets, and clearings up to 2,000 m (7ft) altitude.

The Double Yellow variety forms a compact and leafy clump of 40 cm (16in) in all directions consisting of palmate, slightly dentate, dark green and glossy basal leaves. These are evergreen, 30 to 40 cm (12 to 16in) long, composed of 7 to 9 leaflets and live for 8 months and are regularly replaced by new leaves.

Between February and April, a bouquet of double flowers, 4 to 5 cm (2in) in diameter, forms among the foliage. These are cup-shaped and inclined, with three rows of petals increasing in size from the centre of the flower to the outer part of the corolla. They are inclined downwards, allowing water to slide off like an umbrella to protect the heart of the flower from rotting. Hellebore is a bushy plant that does not like to be moved once established, with young plants taking some time to flower. The seeds are sown by ants.

Use hellebores like elements of an ancient tapestry, mixing them with brighter-coloured undergrowth plants. They are highlighted when planted near Pieris, moderate-sized rhododendrons, under conifers (especially on wind-exposed sites), and surrounded by primroses, wood anemones, corydalis, dicentras, cardamines, or spring-flowering bulbs and snowdrops. You can also accompany them with ferns and shade-loving iris to create a beautiful contrast a little later in the season. They can be planted in groups, like a bouquet, near the entrance of the house, in shaded areas, to enjoy their early flowering up close. They are suitable as cut flowers and in borders, edges, or planters,... Over time, Hellebore flowers do not wither like the majority of other flowers, but dry up instead.

Each seed-sown hellebore has a unique flower colour: slight colour variations may exist between two plants, which is normal and unavoidable. However, if the difference is too significant and distorts the desired effect, we will refund or replace the affected plant.