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Narrow-leaved Spring Beauty (Claytonia virginica L.)

Also known as Virginia spring beauty, Virginia springbeauty, narrow-leaved spring-beauty, eastern spring beauty, fairy spud.

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Summary
Range
Similar Plants
Habitat
Notes
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Photos

a plant with narrow leaves and two white-and-pink 5-petaled flowers, poking up through leaf litter

Photo © Jonathan Sowers, CC BY 4.0.

↑Summary

A common spring ephemeral native to the eastern US and Canada, with small flowers and narrow leaves.

↑Range - Expand

Legend	Color
Native
Native or Not Present

This map is based on our research. We have checked its accuracy to Level 3 ecoregions. Although this plant occurs somewhere in each of these regions, it may only occur in a small part of some or all of them.

↑Similar Plants

Northern Spring Beauty (Claytonia caroliniana)
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↑Habitat

Virginia spring beauty is found in a wide variety of partly-to-lightly-shaded habitats in the eastern US and Canada. Natural habitats include deciduous woods, especially open woods and areas around cliffs or rock outcroppings, savannas, and occasionally in prairies. Anthropogenic habitats include parks, gardens, cemeteries, partly-shaded lawns, and abandoned fields.

It tolerates a range of moisture conditions, from consistently moist to dry-mesic, but it requires good drainage; it is restricted to the better-drained portions of floodplains. It is mostly-restricted to soils with a pH less than 6.0, but prefers soils towards the high end of this range and becomes less common on strongly acidic soils. It requires a well-developed soil rich in organic matter and is most abundant in loam and clay-loam. In soils with a higher clay, sand, or rock content, it is more demanding of organic matter as it can suffer from both drought and poor drainage.

Relative to other spring ephemerals, Virginia spring beauty is slightly more tolerant of degradation and disturbance, and as such it has fared slightly better in response to widespread habitat destruction by humans. It is not among the early colonizers of disturbed sites, but it returns much earlier than most other forest-dwelling spring ephemerals.

↑Notes

Some sources cite the common "grass-flower" to refer to this species but we recommend against the use of that name because it has been used to refer to a nearly endless variety of flowering plants that commonly grow in lawns.