Epimedium flavum (barrenwort)

Epimedium flavum is found in Sichuan Province (Tianquan Xian, on the eastern side of Erlang Shan), central China, at elevations of 1,800–2,000 m.

Epimedium flavum (Image: RBG Kew)

Epimedium flavum has a compact rhizome and forms dense clumps, reaching up to 30 cm tall. The leaves have five (sometimes three) leaflets. The leaflets are heart-shaped, rounded and have sharp teeth around the margin. It has 3–10 sulphur-yellow, long-spurred flowers on upright stems. The flowers are around 3 cm across and have four inner sepals 11 mm long with rounded petals and slightly curved, spreading spurs.

Epimedium flavum illustrated by Christabel King (1995) in Curtis’s Botanical Magazine (Image: Christabel King)

Curtis’s Botanical Magazine (Editor: Martyn Rix) provides an international forum of particular interest to botanists and horticulturists, plant ecologists and those with a special interest in botanical illustration.

Now well over two hundred years old, the Magazine is the longest running botanical periodical featuring colour illustrations of plants. Each four-part volume contains 24 plant portraits reproduced from watercolour originals by leading international botanical artists. Detailed but accessible articles combine horticultural and botanical information, history, conservation and economic uses of the plants described.

Published for the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew by Wiley-Blackwell Publishing.
See the Wiley-Blackwell Subscription Information page for rates (for both print and online).

Epimedium flavum is included on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species as Vulnerable (VU D2). Species listed as VU D2 face a high risk of extinction because of their limited distribution (i.e. restricted area of occurrence or small number of locations) and are vulnerable to the effects of human activities or random disasters. They may therefore become Critically Endangered or even Extinct in the short term.

Epimedium flavum is grown as an ornamental.

Epimedium flavum is growing in the Woodland Garden.

Pressed and dried, and alcohol-preserved specimens of Epimedium flavum are held in Kew’s Herbarium, where they are available to researchers from around the world by appointment. The details of some of these specimens can be seen online in the Herbarium Catalogue.

Search Kew's databases for more information on this species

ARKive – Epimedium flavum

Flora of China – Epimedium flavum

Buy ‘The Genus Epimedium: and other Herbaceous Berberidaceae’ from Kewbooks.com

Browse images of other Epimedium species

Curtis’s Botanical Magazine (Wiley-Blackwell)