Climbing Corydalis

Discovering new wild flowers that have escaped your attention for a lifetime is a source of delight. Mark kindly identified the delicate flower in yesterday's post as the Climbing Corydalis. Despite its small scale it is flowering in September so the lack of competition should have made it more noticeable. Looking at my books I see Rose has it as being locally common though there was but a small patch here. Corydalis claviculata, according to Phillips, is also called White Climbing Fumitory.

Like many delicate flowers it's not easy to photograph effectively and others have also struggled as evident in illustrations on the web. All the better in this respect that those dedicated artists in botanical illustration should have a chance to show that the camera is not everything. My photos today at least had the advantage of better light but the sunlight on the tiny white flowers is a minefield for contrast problems.

Searching the plant's name did bring up one item that (irrationally) depressed me. It seems there is a species of weevil associated with the Corydalis that has become a target for the biodiversity people. It now has its own Action Plan. Why do I suddenly feel rather tired?