Surrey Homes | SH101 | June 2023 | Education Supplement inside

Sue Whigham explores the oh-so delicate world of epimediums –
personal favourites that are a little harder to track down
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I’m happy that other names for
epimediums include barrenwort,
‘Bishop’s hat’ and ‘fairy wings’
– but ‘horny goat weed’ is going
too far for a genus of flowering
plants which are not only beautiful
but so delicate and so desirable.
There are more than fifty confirmed
species of epimedium but no doubt
others will be added to the list with
the development of more hybrids
and more species being discovered in
China. Epimediums in the wild grow in
woodland, in mountainous regions and
on river banks in China and other parts
of Asia, as well as in Mediterranean
regions. They are in the Berberidaceae
family and vary enormously in both
leaf shape and colour, as well as flower
shape and colour. The flowers can come
in shades of yellow through to orange
and many shades of pink, red through
to mauves and purples. Flower shapes
include small hanging cup shapes or
bells to pendulous stars resembling
dangling spiders where the flower is
‘predominantly long spurred petals’.
I think that as more hybrids are
produced with more easily remembered
names, like the lovely E. ‘Pink
Champagne’, there will be more
epimediums sold in garden centres.
Specialist nurseries are more used to
fairly unpronounceable Latin names
but not so the garden centres. Imagine
trying to ask for E. lishihchenii or E.
membranaceum unless you are feeling
fairly confident. Shame really as both
plants are lovely. E. membranaceum
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