dont have parhelion ...

just GET winter snow .... totally awesome ..

old camera.. edges are whiter than shown here ... and its limier.. rather than this dark green to my recollection.. though it been a long winter ...hard to remember ...

ken
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Melissa - come over in June and I'll show you a nice 5' clump of Winter Snow. I don't have a mature Parhelion.

My impression from the plants I've seen is that Parhelion has a quite narrow margin and thus not nearly as attractive as Winter Snow. The color of Winter Snow is a nice dramatic shiny contrast, too... my sense of Parhelion, though, is more of a green and white versus the Winter Snow more chartreuse and gold trending to cream margins.

Not to sound negative... but I just don't find Grenfell to be very accurate in her descriptions. It might be due to being on different continents, but she just doesn't see hostas the way I do.

Though I don't always agree with Mark, I do find the Zilis descriptions match up much better with my observations. In the Handbook (2000) he lists Parhelion as a 1997 S&S sport from Walters with "lt green lvs that have creamy white margins" and he describes Winter Snow as a 1999 introuction for Pine Forest Gardens with "leaves gold-centered with a wide white margin."

As I said, my WS, even in quite bright light, tends toward the chartreuse end of the S&S spectrum, with the margins stating out buttery and migrating through cream...

I do have Blizzard - actually had a nice 5' clump of that, but I had to hack it several times up as it was stabilizing into Winter Snow. Now that I think about it,you mentioned something more unique... you might like Blizzard... a nice, streaky S&S - and it will give you Winter Snows as, someone noted previously, "in drifts."

I'll bet I can find that thread... let me search... here it is...
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/hosta/msg0722082923927.html

And Gunther's Prize (the late Gunther Stark of Iowa), once a very rare mottled S&S, seems to be appearing more and more - certainly scores high on the big-interesting-unusual-attractive scale...

I agree...Winter Snow is showier because of the wider margin.

idiot said:

Not to sound negative... but I just don't find Grenfell to be very accurate in her descriptions. It might be due to being on different continents, but she just doesn't see hostas the way I do.

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anyone still have a globe .... mid MI is the 45 parallel .... half way tot eh north pole .. we can get sun tans ....

look at England.. and i am pretty sure they are something like 60th parallel ... 2/3 of the way to the north pole .. and that is why they are a pale/pasty bunch for the most part.. lol

they grow almost all hosta in full sun..

it does not surprise me that thing develop differently over there.. and perhaps not grow with the vigor ours do ...

but alas .... just a theory ...

ken

cant you mention england without calling us a 'pale/pasty bunch'..lol...not sure i totally ken..we have alot of rain over here which helps us grow them with 'vigor'...but 'alas' the slugs and snails put alot of us 'pale/pasty' bunch off growing them!

by the way i really like 'winter snow'