Saxifraga ‘Maria Luisa’

This alpine plant was blooming in the covered beds at the Berry Botanic garden today. There are so many kinds of Saxifraga that they’ve been placed in 11 groups by growth habit. This is the Porophyllum type, which is a low mound of evergreen, silvery leaf rosettes with early blooming white flowers. Saxifraga is Latin for ‘break rock’, referring to how they are often found growing from stone crevices.

I don’t know who this cultivar is named in honor of: Napoleon’s wife, the Spanish Queen, Maria Louisa de Tassis, (subject of a portrait by Anthony van Dyck)?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 18th, 2006 at 2:42 pmand is filed under Plant Of The Day. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.