The domesticated saffron crocus (C. sativus) is an autumn-flowering perennial plant unknown in the wild. It is a sterile triploid form, possibly of the eastern Mediterranean autumn-flowering Crocus cartwrightianus[10][11][12] that originated in Central Asia.[5] The saffron crocus resulted when C. cartwrightianus was subjected to extensive artificial selection by growers seeking longer stigmas. Being sterile, the plant's purple flowers fail to produce viable seeds; reproduction depends on human assistance: corms, underground bulb-like starch-storing organs, must be dug up, broken apart, and replanted. A corm survives for one season, reproducing via this division into up to ten "cormlets" that yield new plants.[10] Corms are small brown globules up to 4.5 centimetres (1.8 in) in diameter and are shrouded in a dense mat of parallel fibers.
After aestivating in spring, the plant sends up five to eleven narrow and nearly vertical green leaves, each up to 40 cm (16 in) in length. In autumn, purple buds appear. Only in October, after most other flowering plants have released their seeds, do its brilliantly hued flowers develop; they range from a light pastel shade of lilac to a darker and more striated mauve.[13] Upon flowering, plants average less than 30 cm (12 in) in height.[14] A three-pronged style emerges from each flower. Each prong terminates with a vivid crimson stigma 25–30 mm (0.98–1.2 in) in length.[10]
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