Tuberous Corydalis 2021

[Mariette]

Yesterday I had to rescue my Corydalis marschalliana into the greenhouse to be able to harvest some seed. Our sparrows take a special interest in corydalis capsules, they already stripped the right stalk of them.

[Leena]

Mariette, that is a nice plant. Also here I rarely get seeds from C.marschalliana, maybe birds take them here, too.

Pictures of my Corydalis.
'George Baker'
'Beth Evans'
Corydalis wendelboi 'Abant Wine' almost smothered by Leucojum vernum seedlings, this year I must remember to rescue it!
Corydalis kuznetsovii
C.kuznetsovii x C.solida hybrid 'Drops of Claret'

[Leena]

Another 'George Baker', or actually there is somewhere among them the original GB, and then it has seeded so there are many seedlings and I can't tell anymore which one was the original plant.
The second picture is a seedling of 'George Baker', very nice also.

Originally when I bought the first red Corydalis, I thought that hopefully one day they would produce a lot of seedlings (red), and now that day has come.

[Leena]

Corydalis marschalliana, a very big plant, but for some reason I have never gotten seeds from it.

[Mariette]

Leena, Yours looks very different from what I got, doesn´t seem to be the same plant, what do You think? The racemes are longer and more upright, and the colouring isn´t what I would expect from C. marschalliana. My single plant sets seed very well, after I moved it to the greenhouse, I was able to harvest about a dozen.

[Leena]

Mariette, you are right. They don't look the same!
Maybe there is a lot of variation in C.marschalliana? My plant in the picture was bought from Janis in 2013, and then I bought C.marschalliana from Bondarenko in 2016 which looks different (besides colour).
Here is another picture of Janis plant and then creamy coloured from Bondarenko, pictures yesterday.

[Mariette]

As far as I learnt from Bleeding Hearts, Corydalis and their Relatives by Tebbitt, Lidén and Zetterlund, Corydalis marschalliana is a yellow-flowered tetraploid of C. cava from Crimea and not recognized as a species. As I was interested to grow a yellow-flowered corydalis, I´m pleased with what I received from Augis Bulbs, especially, as it sets seed. Recently I ordered another one from Bondarenko, who describes the plant as yellow-flowered, too.

[Leena]

Mariette, I will look closely my plants today and take more pictures.

[Leena]

About my pinkish C.marschalliana. When I bought it in 2013 I had written down from Janis's catalogue the following:
"This is a Caucasian form from Kabardino-Balkaria, which differs from the typical form in having lilac tint in the upper flowers. Easy, but must be planted immediately and naturalizes here. Can be slightly variable."
He also talks in his book Buried Treasures about a form purpureo-lilacina from North Caucasus. According to his book the typical form of C.marschalliana is yellow and is lumped together with C.cava, but they never hybridized, so that is why he has kept the name C.marschalliana.

Whatever my plant is, it is a really beautiful, but why it hardly ever produces seeds is a mystery.

I have also C.marschalliana 'Crimea', bought from Augis in 2015, and it is also a very beautiful plant. Some years I have gotten seeds from it but not always, but it is a very early flowerer here so cold weather may be a reason why there are not always seeds. Two years ago I got a good crop of seeds, and there are even self sown seedlings around it from that year.
First picture is when it started to flower in mid April and the second was taken yesterday.
C.marschalliana 'Crimea' is different then C.marschalliana Bondarenko though both are pale yellow.

I have had C.cava now for 13 years. The first corm was bought also from Janis, and it flowered couple of years and then one winter it vanished. Luckily there were self sown seedlings and I now have several big plants of it. It is a very nice dark blue/purple flowering plant, but the flower spikes are not as massive as in my C.marschalliana.
C.cava Alba was bought from Augis in 2011 and like C.cava it produces lot of seeds every year. It is a bit smaller plant than my C.cava

[Leena]

Here are comparaison pictures of the leaves.
In the first picture the plants are from the right:
C.cava, C.marschalliana Ruksans, C.marschalliana Bondarenko and in the most left C.marschalliana 'Crimea'
Second picture C.cava with more divided leaflets
Third picture C.marschalliana 'Crimea' with more entire leaf lobes.
Fourth picture C.marchalliana R which looks more like intermediate of the first two.
Fifth picture there is C.cava on the left and C.cava Alba leaf on the right.

[Gabriela]

Very nice C. marschalliana Leena!
I also have 2 years old seedlings planted in the ground last summer and they showed huge leaves (the rabbit was particularly excited about them
 I look fwd to the next spring to see them flowering.

Here is what I know: C. marschalliana is actually recognized as a subspecies of C. cava and is indeed a tetraploid.
While C. cava is distributed in Europe (main color is purple), C. cava ssp. marschalliana grows wild only in SE Europe to Caucasus and can have flowers in different colors.

I also read somewhere that the tuber is not hollow like in cava, but this is something which needs verifying. Maybe next spring I'll dig up a seedling to see if it is true.

On the inaturalist website there are many pictures taken in the wild (with locations):
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=any&taxon_id=126194

[Gabriela]

The Corydalis seeds are ready so I looked more closely at some of them, and in proves that the very fragrant Corydalis I shown, with a very dense inflorescence, is not solida, but C. cava or a hybrid - taking in consideration the entire bracts.
Maybe a hybrid with your purple C. cava Leena? or who knows. I would try to separate the tuber, it would be so worthy to multiply it.

[Tristan_He]

Interesting Gabriela. Not sure I completely buy that it's a hybrid - some of the lower bracts in your photo are slightly toothed. Maybe it's intraspecific variation? Some of my red C. solida have very similar looking bracts.

Also if it is a hybrid, there could be other candidates other than cava. Looks like it's setting seed anyway, will be interesting to see what comes up.

Best wishes, Tristan

[Gabriela]

Interesting Gabriela. Not sure I completely buy that it's a hybrid - some of the lower bracts in your photo are slightly toothed. Maybe it's intraspecific variation? Some of my red C. solida have very similar looking bracts.

Also if it is a hybrid, there could be other candidates other than cava. Looks like it's setting seed anyway, will be interesting to see what comes up.
Best wishes, Tristan

You don't have to buy it Tristan, I am not selling 

This was a follow up conversation because I first thought to be a C. solida specimen. If you read my post careful, you'll notice that I said "maybe" and "who knows"....all I care is that is the most fragrant Corydalis I've ever had.

My speculation of being a hybrid is based on: the bracts, yes, some of the lower ones are a bit toothed but the uppers are entire, like C. cava, C. cava ssp. marschalliana and C. caucasica have. Corydalis solida never shows entire bracts (if you have some like that they are not pure solida).
Also on the dense inflorescence, very similar with C. marschalliana. It also has to be from the species that Leena has in the garden. But again, who knows....

[Tristan_He]

You don't have to buy it Tristan, I am not selling 

That's too bad Gabriela! Let me know when you are, it's a lovely Corydalis, whatever it is.