Chickweed Wintergreen
Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/aspivey/public_html/roofing.mktips.info/wp-content/plugins/amazonfeed/php/amazonfeed.class.php on line 354
Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/aspivey/public_html/roofing.mktips.info/wp-content/plugins/amazonfeed/php/amazonfeed.class.php on line 354
Anyone not familiar with these rare and now fast-disappearing plants might think that the small woodland Cyclamen is merely a bedraggled offshoot of a once-large specimen purchased at the florist’s.
Every petal has a long, sometimes hooked, spur. Some cultivated varieties - for this is a popular garden flower - have spurs several centimetres long. In the wild, Columbine grows in shaded broad- leaved woods, as well as forest margins, clearings, and meadows, especially on limestone substrates. A companion of mixed broad-leaved scree stands and humus-rich soils, Columbine is found all over Europe.
At lower elevations it is found only alongside streams and on colluvial deposits, as well as in peaty birch woods, and grows only on distinctly acidic soils. Its distribution is circumpolar.
In the Savoy Alps it has been illegal to gather cyclamen since the begin- ning of this century. The generic name Cyclamen is derived from the Greek word kyklos, meaning circular - a reference to the rounded tubers which were called tuber terrae, or ground tubers, by the Romans.
The stems are erect with a cluster of obovatc-lanceolate leaves beneath the flower. The flowers are white with seven sepals, seven petals, seven stamens, and an ovary composed of seven fused sections. The fruit, a capsule splits by seven valves. Also seen is the occasional pink specimen.
Garden varieties of Columbine are derived from many species native to countries other than those in Europe. Best known are the North American species A. ehrysantlia Gray and A. skinneri Hook of New Mexico. Columbines flower from May until the end of June.
