Wood Poppy

Stylophorum diphyllum

Wood poppy brightens the spring shade garden with 2-inch bright golden-yellow flowers that open over deeply lobed, blue-green leaves in April and May. The color is warm and saturated. a true yellow-gold that glows in dappled light the way only yellow flowers do in shade. It blooms at the same time as Virginia bluebells and trout lilies, and the combination is one of the classic spring woodland scenes in eastern North America. Unlike most spring ephemerals, wood poppy doesn't fully go dormant in summer. the foliage persists (though it may look ratty in drought), and in good conditions it self-seeds gently to form spreading colonies over time. A beloved native for the shade garden that's still less common in cultivation than it deserves to be.