Primula auricula 'Cornmeal'
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Primula auricula 'Cornmeal'• Click here to visit our Main Plant List page for current availability of this plant
• common name: primrose, auricula primrose or auricula
• flowering season: April into May
• height: 4 to 6 inches
• Light requirements: full sun or filtered light, afternoon shade where summers are hot
• Soil requirements: average soil when planted in the ground; quickly draining soil when grown in a pot
• Water requirments: average
• Growth habit: grows as a clump of shoots; older shoots can become leggy and will benefit from being replanted deeper every few years
• How to propagate: dividing in either spring or early fall
• Ways to use it: grows well in the garden or will live happily in a 6 or 8-inch pot for several years before needing to be divided and repotted; plants that are grown in pots can easily be wintered over in the garden by removing them from their pots in September or October and planted in a protected spot on the east side of a house, to be returned to their pots in February or March, in time for their mid-spring flowering
• Special characteristics: both the flowers and the foliage have a slightly spicy fragrant scent; because it is native to higher mountainous elevations, it much prefers cool summers rather than hot humid ones -- although it is possbile to grow it in warmer climates, it is suggested not to keep the roots constantly damp and giving it afternoon shade; we recommend allowing a plant to dry out considerably between deep watering, and also misting the leaves; one secret to keeping it happy is either growing it in a terra cotta pot or giving it a potting soil that is 50% pumice or perlite
• Other points of interests: some historians believe the ancestors of this plant were collected from their native range in the Alps mountains of Europe and were the first plants grown in pots by Europeans; they were highly prized by Victorian gardeners during the nineteenth century when many unusually colored varieties were available
The petals are heavily dusted in powdery meal. They are a grayish green with a blaze of black at their bases, creating a circle of inky blackness surrounding an inner circle of white and an eye of cornmeal. The white eye also turns to the color of cornmeal as it ages. Grown by Cyrus Happy. Classified as a gray-edged show auricula.
If you have a copy of the book Perennials, a Time-Life book, published in 1972 and written by James Underwood Crockett, you can see a photo on page 71 of the person, Cyrus Happy, who selected and named this primrose. The caption that accompanies the photo states, “Cyrus Happy, a photographer-editor of industrial publications who lives in Tacoma, Washington, displays some of his prized collection of auriculas on a wrought-iron stand that is a relic of the Victorian period in England, when primrose gardens were fashionable.”
Incidentally, this book is one of the best ever written on the subject of herbaceous perennials -- for its clarity, breadth of knowledge, quality of photographs, and the inspiration it offers to budding gardeners.