Trevarno daffodil collection to be removed
A collection of daffodils which attracted visitors from around the world is to be removed after the sale of a Cornish estate.
More than 2,500 varieties were planted in a field at Trevarno near Helston.
The new owners of the house and gardens want privacy and are in talks to have the bulbs lifted from the fields.
Ron Scamp, one of the three growers who compiled the collection, said it was "unlikely" it would stay together.
The Trevarno collection, which started in 2008, was built up by Mr Scamp, a Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) gold medal winner, and Mark Vandervliet, who runs a daffodil company in Cornwall.
It was boosted in 2009 by the arrival of more than 1,000 cultivars from Dutch daffodil collector Carlos Vanderveek.
The collection contains 2,500 varieties and had been the largest open to the public in Europe, according to the RHS.
Mr Scamp said: "In the peak season there would be a million flowers on display of 2,500 different sorts."
Trevarno Gardens closed its doors to the public in April 2012. The country estate was sold at the end of September.
Mr Scamp said: "The bulbs will go back to the contributors. The collection became internationally known.
"It is very unlikely it can be created again. The running cost is very expensive. A collection like that costs many thousands of pounds a year to maintain."
At the time of the sale, Estate agent Andrew Harvey said former owners Mike Sagin and Nigel Helsby "did their utmost" to sell the estate to a buyer who would keep the gardens open to the public, but "this did not prove possible" and the property was to be a private residence.