Lincolnshire farm grows rare white poinsettias for Christmas

The white Alaska poinsettias originate from a town in southern Italy

A Lincolnshire flower grower has started producing a rare white poinsettia.

Bridge Farm Group in Spalding is one of the UK's biggest growers of the plants, producing more than a million per year.

While there are many different varieties, the traditional red plant is a regular sight at Christmas.

However, this year Bridge Farm have grown white Alaska ones, which originate from Sabaudia, in Italy, 62 miles (100km) south of Rome.

The firm's managing director David Brown said: "There are more than 100 different poinsettia varieties in shades of red, pink, white, yellow, orange, purple and even multi-coloured ones.

"So we'll be excited to see how popular the white ones are with shoppers this year."

Bridge Farm Group in Spalding produces more than one million poinsettias each year

The plants will cost £12 each and be sold by a national supermarket chain.

Poinsettias originated in Mexico where they originally grew much like a weed.

They are named after Joel Roberts Poinsett, who was a representative of the United States to Mexico as well as a keen botanist.

They were successfully cultivated in the USA during the early 1900s by a German immigrant named Albert Ecke.

Later generations of the Ecke family successfully marketed poinsettias as a Christmas-themed plant during the second half of the 20th century, and they are now widely associated with the festive season.

The white version will be sold alongside the traditional red version

Tesco plant buyer Vicky l'Anson said she hoped the white version would "create a real wow factor with shoppers".

"Over the last few decades poinsettias have established themselves as the number one gifting flower over the festive season and are as much a symbol of the start of Christmas as mince pies," she said.

The poinsettia season is one of the shortest for house plants as they remain in stores for roughly eight weeks, until the end of December.