Corydalis flexuosa

Over the past decade, the availability of plant material from the Corydalis flexuosa group has rightly become freely available to all.

According to past AGS journals, this was first introduced from China in 1989.

In this short time, the ease of propagation has brought down the price to a point where most of us think nothing of buying another pot, should our clumps die.

Perhaps we could look with fresh eyes, as to the growing needs of this Corydalis?

Mine grow in a variety of locations here in Geelong, the uniting factor is that the soil is both neutral, if not even slightly acid and humus rich-loam and sand, well augmented with leaf mould.

Of the ones which flourish the best, the plants located on a slight slope do best over the winter period, when the leaves are out in the cold light gathering sugars and energy for flowers to come.

They are in active growth, coming out of dormancy here when the first cool days of our Fall, falls. As we approach spring the growth becomes more rampant, and the first flowers appear from late winter-early spring; hanging on until the hottest parts of summer when Corydalis flexuosa here goes dormant for a couple of months or so, depending on our season.

In all parts of Australia this corydalis is hardy, especially if planted on a slight slope to aid with run off of rain.

There is no reason to describe the various forms within Corydalis flexuosa, but if this is your first flirtation with these charming plants please look here for both pictures and a brief description. Corydalis flexuosa group: http://www.terranovanurseries.com/pages/...

When it comes to propagation, division is your best bet. This can be done just about anytime of the year, though spring is probably the best time. Although I can't for the life of me find the reference in my AGS journals, from memory I think that these are self incompatible, which is why they may not be setting seed with some folks. As such, if indeed this is the case, they need to be cross pollinated to produce seeds. For it to set seed, as mine do; one needs more than one clone.

(A collective name for all plants which have been propagated vegetatively, i.e. by cuttings, layering or division, from a single plant. These will all have the qualities of the parent plant, whereas with seedlings there is always the possibility of a variation; and indeed, most of us pray for the probability of this happening, just to give us a little something different.)

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