M. 'Keillour'
A very distinctive cultivar of uncertain origin.
MG Rating: ★★★★   Awards: AGM (2013)
Introduced by: S. Pawley and A. Innes. Named by: The Meconopsis Group, 2002.
Registered by: The Meconopsis Group, 2002.
Flowering: mid-May to early-June. Deep blue, saucer-shaped flowers with a paler blue centre. Half-nodding on first opening but later becoming lateral facing. Their overlapping petals are rounded to broadly ovate and slightly pleated.
Emerging foliage: Pale green, firm, broadly elliptical-oblanceolate upright leaves on short, winged petioles.
Mature foliage: The mature basal leaves have broadly elliptical-oblanceolate lamina on short petioles. The leaf base is attenuate and the apex sub-obtuse. The leaf margins are shallowly and crenately notched.
Fruit capsule: Broadly ellipsoid with deeply grooved sutures, densely covered with pale straw-coloured bristles. Short broad style topped with a prominent rounded stigma.
Etymology: M. ‘Keillour’ is thought to have originated at Keillour Castle in Perthshire which was the former home of Major and Mrs Knox-Finlay. The cultivar was submitted to The Meconopsis Group naming trial in 2001 by Stuart Pawley who had received it from Alan Innes the gardener at Keillour Castle.