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Vascular Plants of California
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Corydalis aurea
GOLDEN CORYDALIS


Higher Taxonomy
Family: PapaveraceaeView DescriptionDichotomous Key
Common Name: POPPY FAMILY
Habit: Annual to small tree; sap colorless, yellow, orange, red, or white. Leaf: basal, cauline, or both, simple and entire, toothed, or lobed, or 1--3-pinnate-dissected or compound; cauline generally alternate; stipules 0. Inflorescence: terminal, 1-flowered or cyme, raceme, or panicle; bracts generally present. Flower: bisexual, radial, bilateral, or biradial; sepals 2--3, shed after flower; petals generally 2 × sepals in number; stamens generally many; ovary 1, superior, chamber 1, style 0 or 1, stigmas or lobes 2--many, ovules few to many. Fruit: capsule, dehiscent by valves or pores, +- nut, or breaking transversely into 1-seeded, indehiscent units. Seed: fleshy appendage generally 0.
Genera In Family: 25--30 genera, 200 species: northern temperate, northern tropics; some cultivated (Papaver, Eschscholzia, Hunnemannia), source of opiates. Note: Stylomecon moved to Papaver. Corydalis, Dicentra, Fumaria in Fumariaceae in FNANM, elsewhere. Glaucium flavum Crantz is a waif. According to FNANM (3:300--301), Hunnemannia fumariifolia Sweet (+- like Eschscholzia except sepals free) an occasional waif in California, but documentation evidently lacking. Fleshy appendage of seed sometimes for dispersal by ants.
eFlora Treatment Author: Gary L. Hannan & Curtis Clark, except as noted
Scientific Editor: Thomas J. Rosatti.
Genus: CorydalisView DescriptionDichotomous Key


Habit: Annual to perennial herb, glabrous, glaucous; sap colorless. Leaf: pinnately dissected to compound. Inflorescence: raceme or panicle. Flower: bilateral; sepals 2, shed at flower or not; petals 4, yellow or white to pink, persistent after flower, outer 2 free, not alike, keeled, upper spurred at base, inner 2 adherent at tips, oblanceolate, crested on back; stamens 6, +- fused in 2 sets, opposite outer petals; ovary obovoid, placentas 2, style 1, stigma lobes 4--8. Fruit: generally linear to oblong, dehiscent from tip. Seed: several to many, 2--2.5 mm, round-reniform, smooth or rough, black; fleshy appendage generally present.
Etymology: (Greek: crested lark)
Corydalis aurea Willd.
NATIVE
Habit: Plant 10--40 cm. Leaf: several to many, 3--18 cm. Inflorescence: raceme. Flower: spurred petal 13--16 mm. Fruit: 18--25 mm.
Ecology: Loose soil in open areas; Elevation: 1500--2800 m. Bioregional Distribution: GB; Distribution Outside California: to Alaska, eastern United States, northern Mexico. Flowering Time: May--Aug
Jepson eFlora Author: Gary L. Hannan & Curtis Clark
Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange)

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Botanical illustration including Corydalis aurea

botanical illustration including Corydalis aurea

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Citation for this treatment: Gary L. Hannan & Curtis Clark 2012, Corydalis aurea, in Jepson Flora Project (eds.) Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/eflora_display.php?tid=20432, accessed on April 25, 2024.

Citation for the whole project: Jepson Flora Project (eds.) 2024, Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/, accessed on April 25, 2024.

Corydalis aurea
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©2005 Steve Matson
Corydalis aurea subsp. aurea
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©2015 Barry Breckling
Corydalis aurea
click for enlargement
©2005 Steve Matson
Corydalis aurea
click for enlargement
©2005 Steve Matson
Corydalis aurea subsp. aurea
click for enlargement
©2015 Barry Breckling

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Geographic subdivisions for Corydalis aurea:
GB
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map of distribution 1
(Note: any qualifiers in the taxon distribution description, such as 'northern', 'southern', 'adjacent' etc., are not reflected in the map above, and in some cases indication of a taxon in a subdivision is based on a single collection or author-verified occurence).





 

Data provided by the participants of the  Consortium of California Herbaria.
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Blue markers indicate specimens that map to one of the expected Jepson geographic subdivisions (see left map). Purple markers indicate specimens collected from a garden, greenhouse, or other non-wild location.
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CCH collections by month

Duplicates counted once; synonyms included.
Species do not include records of infraspecific taxa, if there are more than 1 infraspecific taxon in CA.
Blue line denotes eFlora flowering time (fruiting time in some monocot genera).