Epimedium - various threads gathered together here

[gote]

My goodness, Philip, if you had posted this on April 1st I would have had to dismiss it as a fantasy 
An extraordinary size of Epimedium... and what a great colour 

If you read Stearn's book you will find some large species and if grown with skill and TLC they are likely to become great and gigantic plants.
Let us hope that they become more easily available.
Göte

[Maggi Young]

My goodness, Philip, if you had posted this on April 1st I would have had to dismiss it as a fantasy 
An extraordinary size of Epimedium... and what a great colour 

If you read Stearn's book you will find some large species and if grown with skill and TLC they are likely to become great and gigantic plants.
Let us hope that they become more easily available.
Göte

Reading is one thing...seeing is another    (From a country in the throes of an election!! )

[shelagh]

Our Epimediums have been slow to start this year but here are 2. Epimedium ogisui and E. davidii.

[TheOnionMan]

Our Epimediums have been slow to start this year but here are 2. Epimedium ogisui and E. davidii.

Shelagh, a great start to the epimedium season, don't you think the asiatic epimedium are fantastic with their red-mottled spring foliage colors, practically worth growing for the foliage alone; not to slight the big spidery flowers which are also a delight! 

Here the Epimediums are a full 3 weeks ahead.  More photos forthcoming.

[TheOnionMan]

The Epimedium season is suddenly upon us with wild abandon here in Northeastern USA, fully 3 weeks ahead of normal due to a series of weather contitions; an unusually mild spring, a few periods of record rainfall (with flooding), fueled by extended periods of warm and mild dry sunshine, including a couple days of record heat.  The Epimediums are jumping out of the ground! 

1 - 3  E. epsteinii, an evergreen species named as recently as 1994, It is slow to become established, but once happy it makes a striking specimen, with leathery dark green evergreen foliage mixed with orange-bronze new foliage, and discreet panicles of substantial flowers of exceptionally broad white sepals, contrasting with the dark purple cup and petals.  This is a plant that needs to be planted high on an enbankment to best appreciate the beautiful down-faced blooms.

4.  E. fangii - this photo shows a bit of dark green oval evergreen foliage mixed with a small emerging leaflet of rich mottled red... more to come.  This plant is one that Darrell Probst introduced as a hardy growable form from Mt. Emei China, of an otherwise tempermental not-so-hardy species from previous introductions. This one is a "spreader" with long annual rhizomes, so site it accordingly.  It has large yellow flowers.  Quickly becoming one of my favorites.

5 - 7  E. fargesii, a Chinese species that is hard to capture photographically. Long slender spine-edged evergreen leaflets and slender tallish panicles with down-turned delicate white flowers, like little slender white "shooting stars" with reflexed sepals and small grape purple centers.  Enchanting.

8 - 9  E. stellulatum, another Chinese evergreen species.  Photo 8 shows the basal evergreen spine-edged foliage, a nice base to light filmy panicles of starry white flowers with yellow centers, with a haze of spring cauline leaves that are variably marbled red, bronze and green.  In my photos, the flowers are just starting to open. A good one to be sure!

10.  E. leptorrhizum, a Chinese species that is very low and spreading up to 8" annually on long stolons.  As it is, I have not sited it well, must replant it where it is free to create a spreading groundcover without invading neighbors.  The spidery light pink blooms are extra large held close to the textured olive bronze-tinged foliage.

[Hans J]

here a other Epimedium from me :

Epimedium grandiflorum 'Coelestre'

[shelagh]

Looking very good Mark.  We have another pink one in the front garden but it is so low I'm not sure if I can bear to grovel down and snap it.

[TheOnionMan]

Looking very good Mark.  We have another pink one in the front garden but it is so low I'm not sure if I can bear to grovel down and snap it.

By the way, I forgot to mention about E. ogisui, it is definitely an attractive species, there are not many with all white flowers. It is a species I do not yet grow but must try sometime, but it is one of the few epimedium species listed as USDA Zone 6, so it might be a little tender in my colder Zone 5 garden.

[gote]

My goodness, Philip, if you had posted this on April 1st I would have had to dismiss it as a fantasy 
An extraordinary size of Epimedium... and what a great colour 

If you read Stearn's book you will find some large species and if grown with skill and TLC they are likely to become great and gigantic plants.
Let us hope that they become more easily available.
Göte

Reading is one thing...seeing is another    (From a country in the throes of an election!! )

Growing them is a third - however, one must get them first.
Göte

[TheOnionMan]

It is Epimedium madness time here, all busting into bloom.  I share a miscellany of Epimedium images that caught my fancy in the bright sunlight yesterday (and sunny and warm again today... more epimedium photo shoots!).

1   -  colorful epimedium leaves catching afternoon sunlight in the garden
2   -  E. grandiflorum 'Lavender Lady' overlooking maidenhair fern fronds and pulmonaria.
3   -  view of young epimedium foliage, top center is the giant E. grandiflorum 'Red Queen'
4   -  epimedium foliage, E. x versicolor 'Versicolor' at centerstage with red, green-veined leaves, and E. grandiflorum 'Cocolate
        Lace' to the left.
5   -  splash of orange in my allium garden, Epimedium x warleyense flowering prolifically.
6-9 - Epimedium pinnatum ssp. colchicum flowering.  Evergreen foliage cut off to see the floral show. 
        The young leaves are inrolled showing off their fuzzy backsides.
10  - Bed of mixed hybrid seedlings, those with wonderful coffee and caramel toned leaves are hybrids between
        E. grandiforum f. flavescens 'La Rocaille' x E. grandiforum 'Dark Beauty'

[Olga Bondareva]

Mark
Thank you very-very much maintaining this topic! While my Epimeds are still sleeping I enjoy yours and learn more about them.

[TheOnionMan]

I grow approximately 180 different species and cultivars.  But now I'm wondering why there aren't a million hybrids, as they are all so willing to hybridize.  I had heard that most epimedium are self sterile, and need other plants/species around, and then they freely hybridize.  In 2005, I started getting many seedlings around parent plants; they're such cute seedlings I couldn't throw them away, so I decided to pot them up and eventually plant them out, labeling the seedlings as to what parent plant they were found near.  Well, I am just dazzled by the results.  So I include two photos of Epimedium grandiflorum 'Dark Beauty', one of the most dramatic cultivars with foliage that emerges near black-red, then goes through a gorgeous transformation through all shades of reddish brown, coffee, and caramel leaf colors.  I follow with 4 photos of mixed hybrid seedlings, many being hybrids with 'Dark Beauty', inheriting the same dramatic spring foliage color.

Today the flowers started opening on 'Dark Beauty', so I spent a couple hours this morning hand pollinating and making intentional crosses... such fun! I'm selecting specific parents that possess desirable qualities, then dabbing pollen.  While epimedium flowers are small, they're actually fairly easy to work with to make crosses, some species/culivars having more abundant easy-to-access pollen than others.

[Carlo]

Beautiful Mark! Fall foliage in spring!

[Lesley Cox]

What a gorgeous lady is the 'Dark Beauty.'

[TheOnionMan]

What a gorgeous lady is the 'Dark Beauty.'

Lesley, I notice in your various posts, that you like dark color flowers and plants.  More dark eppies coming....