Hi Folks. I have been growing gladioli for a few years, but I have been lifting the bulbs each year. This year I got a bit lazy and left them in the ground, When they flowered this year they had changed color to manly red and some are white, Very few have kept there original color. Can anyone out there tell me why this happens. I had lovely colors ranging from greens to purple & pinks. Hope someone can tell me why this happened Thank you. Gilbert.
Interesting to me, the non-technical answers I googled come from New Zealand and Australia. They tell us that it's not reversion, but proliferation that seems to be the key. The fancier colors are somewhat weaker and will produce fewer new corms, while the more traditional colors are more vigorous, producing more corms and thus more flowers.