Wild Columbine

Posted by Monte Stevens (Westerville, United States) on 8 May 2009 in Plant & Nature and Portfolio.

The above image of a Wild Columbine was taken at Blendon Woods Garden neat the visitors information building. This beautiful woodland wildflower has showy, drooping, bell-like flowers equipped with distinctly backward-pointing tubes, similar to the garden Columbines. These tubes, or spurs, contain nectar that attracts long-tongued insects especially adapted for reaching the sweet secretion. European Columbine (A. vulgaris), with blue, violet, pink, or white short-spurred flowers, was introduced from Europe and has now become well established in many parts of the East. It is different from its cousin, the Colorado Blue Columbine, which I am familiar with in that it droops downward while the Colorado Blue Columbine tips upward. It is a beautiful flower.

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