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Smallflower columbine

Aquilegia brevistyla

Also called Blue Columbine, Small Flowered Columbine, Small Flower Columbine

Smallflower columbine
Photo: Mary Vaux Walcott, Public domain

Smallflower columbine is a rhizomatous perennial wildflower from northern North America, with small nodding blue flowers and compound leaves. It is grown as a hardy, low-maintenance native in cool temperate gardens.

Family
Ranunculaceae (Buttercup family)
Grows as
Perennial
Light
Part shade, Full sun
Water
Keep soil evenly moist during the growing season and let the top layer dry slightly between waterings.
Soil
Well-drained, moist, fertile loam.
Temperature
Hardy to very cold winters; protect young plants from extreme heat above 30 °C.
How easy
Easy
Safety
Toxic: Like other columbines, the seeds and roots contain cyanogenic and other compounds that can cause nausea and illness if eaten in quantity.
Native range
Subarctic America to NW. & NC. U.S.A.
Climate
temperate

About

Aquilegia brevistyla is a species of flowering plant in the buttercup family known by the common name smallflower columbine. It is native to northern North America, where it has a disjunct distribution. Most of its range extends from Alaska through much of Canada, and it also occurs in a few areas in the contiguous United States, such as the Black Hills of South Dakota and central Montana. It is most common in eastern Alaska, Yukon, the southern Northwest Territories, and northern parts of Alberta, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan.

This species is a rhizomatous perennial herb with stems up to 80 centimeters (31 in) tall. The leaves are compound, divided into wavy-edged leaflets. Basal leaves are borne on long petioles. Leaves higher on the stem have much shorter petioles. The nodding flowers are small for a columbine species.

Other Aquilegia plants

Aquilegia alpina · Aquilegia amaliae · Fan Columbine · Aquilegia apuana · Aquilegia aradanica · Aquilegia aragonensis · Dark Columbine · Aquilegia atrovinosa · Atwood's Columbine · Aquilegia aurea · Aquilegia ballii · Aquilegia baluchistanica

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Aquilegia brevistyla by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

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