Cladanthus arabicus Golden Crown Seeds

Cladanthus arabicus 'Golden Crown', contrary to what its complicated name suggests, is a simple, yet delightful annual plant: its feathery, silvery foliage is reminiscent of that of the California poppy and its long-lasting blooms look like golden yellow cosmos resting on a nest of leaves. From its North African to Saharan origins, this plant has retained a great love for sunshine and well-drained soils, even dry and rocky ones. Sow in spring, directly in its final position, in sunny borders and rock gardens.

Cladanthus arabicus is a plant with an annual growth cycle, native to the Maghreb (Moroccan Anti-Atlas, Algeria, Tunisia), Libya, Sicily and southeastern Spain. Its natural distribution also includes areas such as the Western Sahara. In the wild, it grows in pastures, cultivated fields, stony areas and steppes in dry regions. It is often found rooted in rock crevices. Like all plants of dry to arid climates, it adapts its growth and flowering cycle to that of the rains: in our cool temperate climates, Cladanthus germinates in spring and blooms all summer long. On the other hand, in Mediterranean regions, it rather germinates at the end of summer, goes dormant in the winter and flowers in spring. It belongs to the family Asteraceae, as can be seen from its flowers arranged in flower heads. This unusual and charming plant is still a rare find in ornamental gardens.

'Golden Crown' has been selected for its beautiful, bright gold flowers. This plant reaches an average 35-45 cm in height when in bloom, developing one upright primary stem which branches into horizontal to ascending secondary stems that together form a 40 cm wide spreading mound. It is entirely covered with a fine pubescence which gives it an elegant silvery sheen. The basal leaves are deeply cut into narrow linear segments while those on the upper part of the stems are almost whole. Flowering takes place from April to August-September, depending on the date of sowing, and last for about 2 months. At the end of the stems, the inflorescences open revealing flower heads 2 to 3 cm across, placed upon a bouquet of small, finely cut leaves. 3 to 5 new stems develop just below each faded flower head, each producing in turn a new flower head. Each flower head is composed of narrow, toothed, yellow 'petals' or outer ligulate flowers that are arranged in a collar centred around an eye of the same pure yellow colour. The blooms attract many foraging insects.

Cladanthus arabicus Golden Crown is definitely worth discovering and is a great plant to sow on dry slopes, in sunny borders and rock gardens. This plant is not any more difficult to grow than the California poppy and is able to generously fill the dry areas of the garden with blooms where few other plants thrive. Modestly sized and really easy to grow, this plant is also well suited to borders of perennials, it works wonders when sown randomly among other plants. Its very bright blooms will look good in a wildflower meadow. To this purpose, it can be mixed with cornflowers, grasses (Stipa, Carex comans, melica), sainfoin, ornamental onion, borage, common motherwort, corn marigold, Eschscholzia californica, cosmos, love-in-a-mist, Helichrysum...