A new species in the garden this year is the Pacific waterleaf or slender-stem waterleaf ( Hydrophyllum tenuipes) from California, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia. It was a food plant of First Peoples on the West Coast. Mine came courtesy of the Gothenburg Botanical Garden.
Indian salad or Virginia waterleaf (Hydrophyllum virginianum) is also currently in flower and features elsewhere on this blog, being one of my favourite spring salad plants and one of the 80 in my book Around the World in 80 plants.
I’ve failed several times to establish Hydrophyllum canadense, the species I’d expected to be easier. The other I grow is Hydrophyllum appendiculatum which is biennial and not yet in flower.
Tag Archives: Virginia waterleaf
Forest garden companions
Here’s two favourite companions of the edible woodland garden: Virginia waterleaf (Hydrophyllum virginianum) and the climber Caucasian spinach (Hablitzia tamnoides). The plant is for the waterleaf to gradually fill the gaps between the Hablitzia plants.