Pacific Bleeding Heart

April 22, 2021June 14, 2023
Flora and Fauna, Native to BC
by dhir

All photos taken by the author. Last updated April 23, 2021.

Growing between a gravel walking path and train tracks, this patch of Pacific bleeding heart was the largest I’ve seen.

Bleeding heart flowers are really interesting to observe. Their petals are “deeply saccate” (like a sac), much different from the petals of a dandelion flower or cherry blossom tree, those having two dimensional petals. If you brush bleeding heart flower clusters lightly with your hand they knock satisfyingly back as they gently resist moving. As a child, I remember we would tear off the purple bleeding heart petals revealing a “naked lady” inside. I found this blog with an interesting bleeding heart interactive story. Please don’t pick the wild flowers, go instead for a few of the cultivated varieties (see my pics below) if you wish to play with bleeding heart flowers! Showy wildflowers like these are pollinator food and should be left where they are.

A view from a bit farther back. You can see the patch of Pacific bleeding heart in between the grass/buttercups/dandelions in front and blackberries behind.

The light purple flowers grow in clusters of 5-15 flowers, opening at different times. You can see how small they are, each only about 1.5 cm long.

I had to crouch down very low to get this picture. Pacific bleeding heart flowers dangle gracefully from drooping leafless reddish-green stems. There are different colours found in the wild, from white to pink to pale purple.

The leaves of Pacific bleeding heart are deeply lobed, smooth, and dull whitish-green in colour. They remind me of Italian parsley, but don’t eat these leaves.

From this angle you can see the heart-shape of the wild variety, Pacific bleeding heart.

Cultivated bleeding heart *(Dicentra spectabilis)* growing at a schoolyard among other plants. The colour is different and the flowers are much wider than the wild varieties.

Cultivated bleeding heart (*Dicentra spectabilis*) with golden foliage. These flowers are more like charms along a long bracelet rather than a cluster like the wild Pacific bleeding heart.

*Dicentra spectabilis* with “normal” green foliage on the right/top and golden foliage in the bottom left. You can see how much more delicate wild *Dicentra formosa* foliage is compared to this cultivated variety. There are many other cultivated varieties.

When flowers are visible, you are unlikely to confuse other plants with Pacific bleeding heart. The cultivated varieties come in different colours and tend to be much larger (see photos above), while the other two native Dicentra species (D. formosa spp. oregona and D. uniflora) look much different and are much rarer. Pink corydalis (Corydalis sempervirens), which belongs to the same family as Pacific bleeding heart (Papaveraceae, or Poppy family) would be the most similar in appearance but flowers later in the season.

For more information about Pacific bleeding heart please see Washington Native Plant Profile and Sierra Club BC.

So head outside this week, and for the next few weeks, and find some beautiful patches of Pacific bleeding heart in forests and roadsides. Look in peoples’ yards for the cultivated varieties, which tend to bloom for much longer periods.

BOOKS I READ:

“Pacific Bleeding Heart.” The Flora and Fauna of Coastal British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest, by Collin Varner, Heritage House Publishing Company Ltd., 2018, p. 55.

“Dicentra species.” Gardening with Native Plants of the Pacific Northwest Third Edition, by Arthur R. Kruckeberg and Linda Chalker-Scott, Greystone Books, 2019, pp. 214-215.