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Re: [PRIMROSES] Companion plants - Corydalis

Diana Reeck, you wrote about Corydalis and mentioned
C. 'Blue Panda', C. flexuosa 'China Blue', C. elata, C. aquae-gelidae, C.
ochroleuca, C. lutea.

Earlier Cindy Johnson mentioned also C. sempervirens.

There is a lot of valuable information of these and a number of other
Corydalis in the recent book by M. Liden and H. Zetterlund: 'Corydalis, a
gardener's guide and a monograph of the tuberous species', Published by
Alpine Garden Society (AGS) in 1997. I think it is available also from the
NARGS bookshop.

M. Liden is probably the No 1 world authority on Corydalis, especially the
tuberous ones and H. Zetterlund is famous for his growing skills. They are
responsible for the famous Corydalis collection of the Gothenburg Botanical
Garden.

In their book they maintain that the clone C. 'Blue Panda' is the form
coming closest to the type of C.  flexuosa itself.

Both forms of C. flexuosa and the more recently introduced C. elata are
eminent plants and should be grown as widely as possible.

M. Liden is also responsible to a rather recent raxonomic revision (1986)
of the subfamily Fumarioideae to which Corydalis belongs. In this process
the earlier suggested transfer of C. lutea to Pseudofumaria and C.
sempervirens to C. capnoides has been supported and he also transfer C.
ochroleuca to Psudofumaria.

Thus C. lutea is now Pseudofumaria lutea, C. ochroleuca is P. alba and C.
sempervirens  is Capnoides sempervirens.   These namechanges are too new to
have been well known and used by the horticultural community.

All three species are vigorous and prone to selfseeding if they like the
conditions, somtimes being quite nasty weeds in the rock gardens. They are
more suited to the wilder parts of big gardens.

M Liden has made a specific study of C. aquae-gelida and concluded that it
should be named  C. caseana subsp. aquae-gelida. He hopes that it will take
kindly to cultivation as it is a very lovely plant, especially the dwarfer
forms.


Hubert

Hubert Agback, Uppsala Sweden. Winter Min Temp -25C, unreliable snowcover.
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