Sandra's Garden: When Corydalis Corydalisn't

Species name: Pseudofumaria lutea (formerly Corydalis lutea)

Common name: yellow corydalis, rock fumewort

Location: Sandra's garden

Looking at the pictures I took of this plant in Sandra's garden reminds me of how darn windy it was that day; it took me almost 12 pictures to get a decent shot of the flowers since they're so small. Seems like any time I want to take macro shots the wind picks up! This plant is often confused with a very similar genus, the one which the yellow corydalis gets its common name. There are some yellow-flowering corydalis species, and three of which are even native to this area. Unfortunately, this isn't one of them. This yellow corydalis, the rock fumewort, is native to Italy and Switzerland and can become invasive here if not kept in check. The leaves and flowers are both very similar to species of Corydalis, so its understandable for the confusion. Interestingly, the family that this plant belongs in is also often confused! While researching this plant, it was placed in either the Ranunculaceae, the buttercup family, or the Papaveraceae, the poppy family. Which one it truly belongs to I have no idea; since experts in the field can't seem to agree I'm not even going to try to make up my mind! What I do know is that the leaves, with the divided leaves that look similar to fern fronds, look far similar to members of the Ranunculaceae than the Papaveraceae.

The other common name of this plant, the rock fumewort, comes from its ability to grow in seemingly the tiniest of places in a solid rock wall. The seeds do not need a lot of soil to germinate and grow, and the roots can readily absorb nutrients from the smallest pockets of soil to provide the plant with energy. There are also specialized structures that the plant can produce in its roots that are similar to potatoes and meant for the same purpose: starch storage. This means the plant can accumulate sugars from the leaves while it has access to lots of nutrients in soil, and as the nutrients in the soil are depleted it can tap into its own starch storage for fuel to continue growing. This would be the same thing a potato or carrot would do if we gave it the chance! Typically when a plant has a common name with "wort" in it, which means "plant," often was once used for medicinal purposes. I'm not sure what an ancient medicinal use of this plant would be, but it is currently being examined for potential uses as an anti-psychotic drug for use in the treatment of psychoses associated with schizophrenia. Extracts are taken from the leaves and so far they've been showing promise with interfering with neurons (brain cells) at their synapses (where the cells communicate with each other) to prevent the communication between them. Normally this would be a really, really bad thing; if your neurons can't communicate then you can't exist as a normally-functioning human being. All of the information that you receive through your five senses is assimilated in your brain via neuronal synapses and neurons talking to each other. Sometimes, however, this effect can be detrimental if your brain "creates" things that aren't there via neurons communicating with each other when no external stimulus is present. We call these "creations" of the brain psychoses, deliriums or hallucinations (depending on how they're caused and what kinds of symptoms they present) and in psychotic schizophrenia (I'm sure there's a different name for it now; the names of mental illnesses change with the seasons it seems) this happens to an extreme. I'm certainly no neurologist, but some drugs target certain neurons at certain times in certain amounts, which can decrease the symptoms of schizophrenia. All sounds like a bunch of magic to me, which is probably why you should all be happy I'm not a neurologist!

So "can I eat it"? Well, like the last plant I profiled (the grape hyacinth, which you can read all about HERE), there's no suggestion that you can't eat it. But since extracts from the leaves and roots have the ability to interfere with your brain's ability to communicate with itself, do you really want to risk it? There are so many other wild plants that are edible I would choose a different one.

Sandra's Garden: What's eating Gilbert Grape?

Species name: Muscari armeniacum

Common name: grape hyacinth

Location: Sandra's Garden

Grape hyacinths are wonderful little plants, if you're willing to put a wee bit of effort into keeping them tamed. Sometimes called bluebells (although not true bluebells), these plants are native to Europe from Greece to Turkey. They are planted usually from bulbs (although some cultivars do reproduce well from seed) and have a high likelihood to become invasive if you're not careful. Fortunately, they are not good competitors unless they are in full sun, so they, for now, are not invasive in natural areas. The easiest way to control their growth and prevent them from escaping your garden is simply by clipping off the flower heads once the flowers are spent and the fruit starts developing. There is usually a significant delay between the flowers dying and the fruit opening, so even if you miss the last flowers falling off by a couple of days you've still got some time to get your clippers out.

Sandra has two different cultivars of grape hyacinths planted, which are quite striking beside each other in the garden. The first one is the "regular" grape hyacinth with the typical blueish purple bell-shaped flowers with the white border that is slightly frilly. This would be the regular grape hyacinth that you would expect to see in the wild throughout its native range. These are also the kind that produce many, many seeds and almost all of them are fertile (so not only do they spread underground via their bulbs and bulbet production, but also spreading aerially via their seeds). The second one is the doubled grape hyacinth, a cultivar selected to have double the flowers on the stalk. Whenever a doubled cultivar is created, it almost always removes the plant's natural ability to reproduce via seed production. This is great in the case of the grape hyacinth because it provides the same splash of colour at the same time as a regular grape hyacinth but you don't have to worry about it becoming invasive. Best of both worlds!

Strangely enough, despite this being a popular garden plant, I can't seem to find any information on the toxicity of this species. Since it does grow from a bulb a good rule of thumb is not to eat it (onions and their close relatives like chives, garlic and leeks are the only bulbs that are reliably edible no matter what cultivar), and it's also probably a good idea to wear gloves since the sap that comes out of the bulbs when cut may be irritating to the skin. One great reason to plant doubled grape hyacinths in your garden if you live near a natural area is because of deer. Deer absolutely HATE grape hyacinths, and will avoid other plants that are near them. If you have some prized flower bushes or a young tree that you want to protect from deer grazing, planting a border of these plants around them would work very well. Then when the deer are no longer interested (or when your tree is large enough to tolerate having some of its branches stripped of leaves and bark), dig them up and transplant them to a new area that needs protecting!