Common Name: fringe cup
Type: Herbaceous perennial
Family: Saxifragaceae
Native Range: Western North America
Zone: 4 to 7
Height: 1.00 to 2.00 feet
Spread: 1.00 to 2.00 feet
Bloom Time: April to May
Bloom Description: White or pink
Sun: Part shade
Water: Medium
Maintenance: Low
Suggested Use: Naturalize
Flower: Showy
Culture
Best grown in medium moisture, moisture retentive, humusy soils in part shade. Tolerates wet soils. Spreads by thick rhizomes and forms colonies in optimum growing conditions. Grows better in cool climates than hot, humid ones.
Noteworthy Characteristics
Tellima grandiflora, commonly called fringecup, is a clump-forming but spreading perennial which is native to moist woods and slopes from Alaska to Idaho and central California. Fringecup is in the same family as and similar in appearance to Heuchera, Tiarella and Mitella (anagram of Tellima). Features a basal clump of toothed, shallowly-lobed, rounded, hairy, long-stalked, dark green leaves (to 4" across) which typically grow in a mound to 10" tall. Leaves may be tinged with purple and are semi-evergreen in warm winters. Greenish-white, bell-shaped flowers (1/2" long) with five reflexed fringed petals (tiny "fringed cups" as it were) appear in late spring in terminal racemes atop erect, wiry, nearly leafless stems rising well above the foliage clump, thus bringing total plant height when in flower to 24" tall. Flowers mature to pink. Also sometimes commonly called false alum root.
Genus name comes from an anagram of Mitella to which it is closely related.
Specific epithet means large-flowered.
Problems
No serious insect or disease problems.
Uses
Remove flower stems after bloom for attractive ground cover. Best in partially shaded areas of woodland gardens, wildflower gardens, borders or rock gardens. Also may be grown on stream banks, pond edges or in moist meadows.