AQUILEGIA (Aquile'gia)

DESCRIPTION: These hardy perennials are found wild throughout North America, Siberia and other northern temperate regions. Aquilegias, or Columbines as they are commonly known, are grown for their beautiful, spurred flowers that are produced during the summer. A. vulgaris has gray-green leaves that are rounded and deeply divided into thin lobes. Its double, funnel-shaped flowers have short spurs and they grow atop thin stems. They consist of many, slender, red-pink petals, which are tipped with pale green. The leaves of A. canadensis are dark green and deeply divided. Its drooping flowers are bell-shaped and they are yellow with long, straight, red spurs. A. alpina produces blue and white flowers. These plants grow from 24 to 30 inches high and spread 20 inches.

POTTING: These plants will thrive in regular garden soil, but will do much better in ground that is moist and loamy and doesn't dry out too quickly. Leaf mold, compost, or decayed manure should be added to light land. Plant them in a sunny position. A. canadensis prefers sandy soil in dappled shade or sun.

PROPAGATION: Columbines may be divided when in their dormant stage. Seeds may also be sown in the spring or fall, in sifted loam, leaf mold and sand.

VARIETIES: A. vulgaris; A. canadensis; A. canadensis flavescens; A. alpina; A. pyrenaica; A. glandulosa; A. saximontana; A. akitensis; A. coerulea; A. chrysantha; A. longissima.

Columbine Songbird Robin

Columbine Songbird Mix

Columbine Harlequin Mix

Columbine William Guiness

Go see DICTIONARY OF BOTANICAL NAMES.

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