Rodgersia

With stereotypical German directness and efficiency Rotlaub means simply red leaf, no trademarked series name and all rights reserved tradename of Rockstar Red Rager needed when the attractive foliage does the talking for you. In the striking leaf big leagues with things like Gunnera and Podophyllum, Rodgersia certainly holds its own with large, leathery, jagged leaflets in mass layering themselves up to nearly 4 ft when given a nice moist bank to sink their teeth into the sprays of white summer flowers and red new growth in this form are an excess it seems even the most utilitarian of plant-namers can't resist. But don't worry the easy-to-please nature and fair hardiness range recenter things.

The rarest species in cultivation having only first been collected by Tony Schilling in 1966 from a small colony found in the Dudh Kosi Valley in Nepal. This has handsome pinnate leaves and impressive light white flowers on stems to 3' or more. This species just has a subtle different feeling about it than the other Asian species. Very collectable.

Our collection from the Gang Ho Ba in Yunnan at around 10000' back in '97 during our first plant hunting trip to China. This was growing in open woodland up against a massive rock the size of a dump truck with Arisaema consanguineum, Paeonia delavayi, Primula forrestii and Dipelta yunnanensis as companions. The big pinnate leaves were impossible not to notice. This has tall stems 36"- 44" with nice layers of white flowers.