Description
A deservedly, sought-after plant. It is breath-taking and is a “must have” for the connoisseur’s garden.
The above ground growth consists of metre long trailing stems densely clothed in deeply cut, highly decorative silver-grey foliage which in itself is enough reason to grow the plant. In addition however, the plant clothes itself in masses of gorgeous bright yellow flowers. Most are bright yellow, some uncommon forms can be primrose or even (rarely) cream, others are shaded with orange externally.
It makes searching tubers, that can dig themselves down in the ground to a depth of 60cm or more, hence it is not an easily produced plant, commercially. This deep tuber means that it is very hardy. A fact backed up by altitudes of up to 3,300m at which it occurs wild in the Chilean Andes. The deeply set tubers also mean that this is NOT a plant that you should consider transplanting, it hates being moved and you risk setting it back or, most usually, killing it.
Well-drained soil in full sun. These may take a year to burrow and establish themselves, making just a small amount of top growth as they root down but after this, and once the tuber has attained its preferred depth, then the deep-seated tubers become immovable, reliable and pretty much unstoppable.
Our pictures incidentally are taken in the wild, in Chile, the tubers are seed-raised in cultivation from seed from these localities.
