We have gone to great lengths on occasion to write some of our columns, but this one stands out for what we were willing to do for you, dear reader.

The day before Valentine's Day, we drove up and down Interstate 5 for more than four hours to see some of the most beautiful plants we have ever seen at Northwest Garden Nursery in Eugene.

You might say, we went to hellebores and back.

Or not. Probably not.

The varieties grown under the Winter Jewels name by Marietta and Ernie O'Byrne are painstakingly propagated by seed -- one step, repeated every five days, involves a paint brush and pollen -- and lovingly nurtured.

The result is a flower of incredible beauty on a plant so hardy it can grow just about anywhere -- Vermont, Minnesota, North Carolina, Europe, Japan -- except in tropical zones.

And no one has ever confused the climate in Oregon with the word tropical.

These plants can admittedly be hard to come by -- the O'Byrnes have two open nursery days each year, and you already missed one of them (the next is Feb. 27) -- but they do sell in some retail nurseries, too, such as Al's and Portland Nursery and Petal Heads and Xera.

Even if you don't buy a Winter Jewels hellebore, there are numerous others that can bring dramatic color in a winter and early spring garden and beautiful foliage the entire year.

And as for that great length we went to, we'd both do it again in a minute. Make that 125 minutes, each way, and worth every one of them.

Marcia:

When we moved into our house 24 years ago, one of the first plants I bought for our garden was a hellebore I found at the Hardy Plant Society of Oregon's spring plant sale.

It was a beautiful Helleborus argutifolius with simple green flowers, nothing fancy -- but I was smitten.

Since then, thanks to people like the O'Byrnes, the hellebore breeding world has exploded! There are many other species of perfectly wonderful hellebore, many of which we have in our garden. I have to say, though, that Helleborus x hybridus is my favorite.

I really enjoyed and learned a lot from our road trip to Marietta and Ernie O'Byrne's wholesale nursery (you can find it online at

). For instance, hellebores have been bred so that their flowers stand vertically and not facing skyward so they won't hold water and rot.

The flowers come in double, semi-double, anemone, picotee, dotted, blotched, ruffled and an amazing flower color selection that runs from black, red, purple, orange and pink to white and yellow. They are even breeding some pretty wild leaf colors and veining, too.

And if that isn't enough, they are one of the first flowers to grace a winter garden, blooming from January to April. They are shade tolerant, frost tolerant, evergreen, deer resistant and poisonous (hey, you can't have everything).

To keep the color of the parent plant clump, either remove any seedlings as they emerge or remove the seed heads in early May. Bees, doing what bees do, will cross-pollinate your hellebores for you and the babies will not be something you want to brag about to the other hellebore moms in your neighborhood. They will turn out a dusky, muddy rose color and not one true to the parent plant.

The O'Byrnes pollinate their hellebores by hand, with paint brushes, in bee-proof greenhouses, every five days, beginning Jan. 13.

They look for the very best characteristics in the parent plant, such as upright growth, coloring, disease resistance and vigor. It can take quite a few generations to stabilize the characteristics they're looking for.

They place a bag over each flower head at the end of April and collect the seeds from those bags at the end of May. The seeds from each hybrid are cleaned and kept separated and then either sold or planted for next year's crop.

The process is labor-intensive as well as a labor of love, and it shows in the excellence of their hellebores.

Facts

* Plant in cool sun, light, partial to full shade, though dense shade can reduce flowering. Check labels; some take more sun than others.

* Zone 5-9.

* Height 12 to 24 inches, spread 12 to 18 inches.

* Deer tolerant.

* Frost tolerant.

* Poisonous.

* Bloom time is January to April.

* Evergreen.

* Clump forming.

* Tolerant of most soil conditions as long as it's not extremely dry or water-logged.

* Use compost to mulch in the winter, but don't cover the crown of your plants.

* Hellebores in general are trouble free, but can occasionally attract aphids, fungal diseases and slight slug damage.

Tips

1. For Helleborus x hybridus, cut back the leaves just as the flower stalks emerge. For the taller species such as argutifolius and foetidus, cut back the old flower stems after they flower and when new shoots emerge at the base.

2. They don't need to be divided, but if you do, wait until the fall.

3. To keep the color of the parent plant clump, either remove the seedlings as they emerge or in early May cut off all the flower heads that produce seeds.

4. Apply an organic fish fertilizer in the fall.

5. When planting, dig a deep hole and amend with compost or old manure.

*

Marcia Westcott Peck is a landscape designer (

) and Dennis Peck is the director of publications at The Oregonian/OregonLive.