Crocus caspius

From mountain foothills along the Caspian Sea coast of Iran where it grows in scrub and woodland margins. Not a difficult plant to grow in the UK, but little known as almost all the plants in cultivation originate from a collection made in the wild by Rear Admiral Paul Furse almost fifty years ago. It's fairly easy to raise from seed by which means the plant slowly spreads among the crocus cognoscenti.

Admiral Paul Furse retired from the navy to his garden near Smarden in Kent. He was an amateur botanist and accomplished painter of flowers.
Putting into practice the plant-hunting expeditions he had planned for many years, between 1960 and 1966, he and his wife, Polly, made four long journeys into Iran and Afghanistan, collecting bulbs and perennials for the Royal Horticultural Society's garden at Wisley and for Kew, and introducing hundreds of new plants into cultivation.

Could be the last sunlit crocus for a while if the weather forecast is correct. I have a busy schedule ahead but cycled home at lunchtime especially to photograph this beauty.