Bleeding Heart

Bleeding Heart

Bleeding Heart is now in the garden spotlight. I understood this introduced, cultivated plant from Asia to be in the Dicentra genus, along with North American natives (and personal favorites) Dutchman’s BreechesDicentra cucullaria, and Squirrel Corn, Dicentra canadensis. Apparently, when I was not looking, the splitters in the botany community held sway. It has its own genus now as Lamprocapnos spectabilisPer wikipedia, this bleeding heart has leaves along the flower stem, where dicentra does not. There are native wildflowers named Bleeding Hearts in the Dicentra genus, but the pictured plants are the Asian Lamprocapnos. The whole lot of them are in the poppy (“Poppies!”) family.

This image was taken with a Nikon D90 and a Micro-Nikkor 60mm AF f/2.8. ISO 900, f/8, 1/250 sec. I was using the auto-ISO setting. The shutter speed is 1/250 because of the breeze. Post-processing in Aperture was cropping and assorted minor adjustments.