Corydalis lutea in lots of shade?

Just wondering if you have had good experiences growing this "Yellow Corydalis" in lots of shade?

This plant grows in a part of the garden that doesn't get any direct sun and rarely gets supplemental water. It's hard to track the status of just one plant as it tends to seed around some and I'm not sure that any one plant is long-lived. It might be happier if it had more water here. I also grow Corydalis ochroleuca - the white variety - which seems a little happier but behaves similarly. I would love to be able to grow the C. flexuosa blue varieties but they seem to be a little more tempermental in my garden.

I had corydalis lutea in NW Iowa, z4, in full shade and it loved it there. It was a pretty clump year after year and I shared lots of babies with friends.

Now I am in eastern WI, zone 5, and I had one on the east side of the house and it was quite sunburned. A month ago I moved it into full shade and all the sunburned leaves are now happy and healthy.

This is one of my favorite plants as it blooms all summer and is happy in full shade.

My sister had this in her shady garden and it was beautiful. It grows nicely from seed but will not transplant well. Seems to enjoy growing near rocks and cracks. lovely leaves even without the flowers

It not only grows in shade, it has sprung up in unexpected (and occasionally unwanted) places. DW wants to eradicate it, but I sort of admire its pluck.

It is plucky! I got my current plant from a crack in the sidewalk in front of the bakery. They had some in a pot a few years back and the babies kept coming up so last summer I managed to pull one out with a root, nursed it to a nice size and planted it at my sister's. I did the same this spring and now have one for myself. They used something on them a short while later and they all died. I can't wait to see how many seeds will start new plants next spring! ha ha

Cindy, I tried the new yellow-foliaged corydalis 'Berry Exciting' - it has survived admirably so far, despite our humidity. You might try it. Flowers are purple, set off nicely by the golden foliage. It's not very subtle. Foliage is persistent, rather than going dormant early summer, like some of the others.

I was very tempted by 'Berry Exciting' because it's not supposed to go summer-dormant but I wasn't quite sure about the hardiness for me. With a price range of $10 to $15, I wanted to be sure of that.

This past September I planted *7* of the lutea and 3 of the Corydalis "Wildside" (blue flowers). I am doing my best in preparing them for the winter as they are too expensive plants to lose.

I'll be curious about your 'Wildside'. I tried a couple of the blue-flowering types ('Blue Panda' and 'China Blue') several years ago but I failed at growing them. They sort of faded away. Maybe my summers are too hot for them.

Cindy, too hot in your zone *5*? That doesnt bode well for me as I am a zone 5 as well.

It's our summers that can stress some of the plants that come out of the Pacific northwest breeders and growers. I have problems with some of the Heucheras (dependent on parentage) as well. We can get high temps and humidity as well as weeks without significant rainfall here although not as bad as further south.

I usually consider the yellow corydalis lutea a weed especially when it crowds out native ephemerals.
I never planted it and only leave it when it's in the cracks along the pavement.

I love corydalis lutea as it blooms from spring til fall and grows very well under my maple and ash trees where it's very shady and there's not much soil. It's more exuberant where it gets 4-5 hours of sun, but I wouldn't plant it where it gets much more than that. Same for corydalis ochroleuca. I have a blue corydalis - corydalis elata, which has survived several years but seems to want more sun. The one I have in a shady spot didn't bloom this year, but one that gets several hours of morning sun did much better. I had a light blue corydalis last year - don't remember the name, but it didn't come back this year. I also have a corydalis nobilis, which has a lovely bloom, but it doesn't last long, and then it goes dormant. As I don't have a large yard, I'm going to stay away from plants that go dormant in the future.

Nice to know that they can take more sun than I thought. I also tend to avoid those that go summer-dormant as well. I really don't have any native ephemerals here except for spring beauties.

The lovely part of planting native spring ephmerals is that you plant later growing plants also that fill in.
There is never an empty space just a varied sequence of foliage and blooms.
It is similar to planting traditional bulbs that appear before summer flowers.
Some of the ephmerals are so beautiful it is hard for me to imagine a garden without them.
Rue anenome, bloodroot, and Virginia blue bells are some of my favorites.

I have bloodroot and Mertensia but they're not native here. They wander freely in a more remote section of the garden along with the Corydalis. In fact, bloodroot has totally abandoned it's original spot and tucks itself in among Astillbes and Canadian ginger.

I agree with Sempervirens completely! My yard is primarily wooded, so I don't get much opportunity to have one of those traditional spectacular summer sunny borders. So instead, I plant woodland plants, which often are spring ephemerals. I have come to really love them. They bloom so early, it really gives you a jump on the gardening season. And as Sempervirens notes, there are plenty of plants which can fill in the voids left when the ephemerals are gone.

I've seen photos of your garden and plant choices, Weerobin, on this forum, and know you have a wonderful shade garden.
Thanks for affirming the use of ephemerals.
It is exciting to watch for them and wait anxiously for the bloom of some like Twinleaf, Jeffersonia diphylla, that bloom so briefly you have to catch it on the day it does. Waiting for the seed pods to open is also a tricky waiting game but fun and interactive.

I have a combination garden from full sun in the front to shade under 2 90' non native Norway Spruce in the back.
I really enjoy the full sun grasses and forbs that attract many insects, birds and butterflies but the heartbreaking subtle beauty of the spring
ephemerals are clearly my favorites.

Cindy do the bloodroot leaves last most of the season in your garden and just get larger, looking like landlocked waterlily leaves?
It most be lovely among the low growing Canadian ginger. I think I'll try moving a clump or 2 over to area I have large drifts of th Canadian ginger.
I have patches of it throughout the garden but the largest colony is among the Jack-in the- pulpit, under a fall blooming witchhazel
and a baby pagoda dogwood that has yet to bloom.

Hmm - Canadian ginger - I have a love/hate thing going on with that plant. It's interesting to see the little hidden flowers but this stuff is by far the biggest spreader in that more rustic area. It's popped up 30 to 40 ft away from the original planting and it forms large clumps. Must be ants carrying seeds around. It's a little challenging to pull up as well. I'm almost thinking of it as invasive, especially with the root system it develops, really forming a very effective groundcover with no space left for other plants. The bloodroot does hang on to it's leaves most of the season here but the Mertensia does not. I have twinleaf as well but never think of it in terms of "ephemeral" since the leaves hang on all season as does the Anemonella.

I was certainly not trying to put down spring ephemerals, but for me, having a small yard with tons of plants packed way too close together, and always having to dig up plants in order to plant something new, it's just too much and too confusing for me and I could easily dig them up accidentally. If I had lots of room, I'd feel otherwise.

Hmm - it doesn't seem to me that Corydalis is a sturdy plant - the stems seem to be easy to break - but maybe that's due to my growing conditions (dry clay). In your spot, it might benefit from a mulch of shredded leaves or compost.

Cindy, corydalis lutea isn't a sturdy plant and the stems do break easily, but as long as you don't step on it, it's fine. It does seem to like growing where there's very little soil. I've had some gorgeous large plants grow in cracks in cement at the foundation of my house -or cracks in the sidewalk where the seeds planted themselves and they were never taken care of.

Glad to know that my neglect isn't causing the fragility of the plant. :)

rouge, I should modify my statement to say that seeds start themselves very easily in cracks, and undisturbed will grow into large healthy plants. Transplanting is another matter. If there's very little soil, you might want to add a bit more, start with seeds or small plants, and if transplanting, water them well until established. After that they'll be fine.

Mine became very invasive.

They can be invasive, but are easy to pull out. For me they're worth it.

In parts of England (where "full sun" may not be enough to ripen a tomato, and moisture is usually available), C. lutea grows in limestone walls and paving. Bath was full of them. I haven't been able to establish them here, where the only relative that's really reliable for me is Dicentra spectabilis (alba).

Last year I bought a gallon pot of one of the blue hybrids, which was very happy until one day when it died all at once. The soil had gone to dry powder there (despite perennial additions of composted manure) and that was it for that. Try, try again.

Are any of them winter-sowable? Not that I've ever done WS. I have no milk jugs.

Since corydalis lutea self-seeds all over the place, I would think that they'd be easily wintersowable, but perhaps better to just surface sow on the ground. I believe my c. ochroleuca has also self-seeded. Some of the blue varieties are sterile, I've heard, and I've never seen seed pods on my c.elata. I don't know anything about the tuberous varieties, as I stay away from the ones that go summer dormant.
I just started seeds of c.sempervirens and they sprouted warm indoors. I believe this one may be an annual, but is supposed to self-seed.