The flower language of the bleeding heart is unpredictable death and desperate love.
Bleeding heart (Dicentra spectabilis) is native to China, Siberia and Japan. It prefers a semi-shaded environment with ample scattered light and is relatively cold-hardy. It is a perennial herbaceous plant with a height of 30-60cm. The above-ground stems are upright, cylindrical, tinged with purplish red, and the rhizomes are fleshy; the small lobes are usually entire, green on the surface and covered with a white powdery bloom on the underside, with prominent veins on both sides; the petioles are about 10 cm long and resemble those of angelica.
Bleeding heart
Growth habits:
It is cold-hardy but not tolerant of high temperatures, prefers a semi-shaded habitat, and goes dormant in hot summers. It is not drought-tolerant and prefers moist, well-drained, fertile sandy loam.
Distribution range:
It is produced in northern China (as far north as Liaoning), and is distributed in Hebei, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan, growing in moist grasslands and hillsides at altitudes of 780-2800 m. It is also distributed in Japan, Korea and Russia.
Landscape value:
The bleeding heart has beautiful foliage and delicate flowers shaped like pouches, with brilliant colors. It is a good material for potted plants and cut flowers, and is also suitable for arranging flower borders and for mass planting in moist spots at the edges of tree clusters and grasslands, with excellent landscape effects.
Medicinal value:
The whole plant is used as medicine, with effects such as relieving pain, relieving spasms, promoting urination, regulating menstruation, dispersing blood, harmonizing blood, dispelling wind, and eliminating sores and toxins. It is cultivated in gardens for ornamental purposes.
Bleeding heart
Legend:
In ancient times, about 200 li southeast of Luoyang City, there was a prefecture named Ruzhou, and to the west of the prefecture there was a small town named Miaoxia. It was surrounded by mountains with pleasant scenery, and there was also a wonderful custom: once a young man and woman were engaged, the woman had to personally send the man a pouch embroidered with mandarin ducks, the meaning of which was self-evident. If it was a betrothal arranged in childhood, the woman's sister-in-law or the married elder sisters in the neighborhood would embroider one on her behalf and send it as a token for life.
In the town lived a beautiful girl named Yunu. Yunu was eighteen years old, clever and deft, naturally intelligent, and highly skilled in embroidery and weaving. In particular, the various floral patterns she embroidered on pouches often attracted bees and butterflies to land on them, showing the depth of her skill. With such a good girl, suitors naturally crowded her threshold, but they were all politely declined one by one by the girl's family. It turned out that the girl already had a man she loved, and her family had tacitly accepted it. Unfortunately, the young man had been serving in the army beyond the frontier for two years already, with no news, and had never received a pouch. Yunu waited day after day and thought night after night, longing bitterly, so she embroidered one pouch each month to express her longing and hung them one by one on the peony branches before her window. Over time, the pouches formed strings and became what people call the "bleeding heart."
Bleeding heart