CARE. Ordinary soil, even poor; sun or part shade; dry. Plant in fall or spring six inches apart. Easy to grow.
PROPAGATION. Seeds in spring, division.
SPECIAL USES. Rock gardens, dry-wall planting, ground cover, edging.
Alyssum Cruciferae Madwort
Plushy, mat-forming, like a silver-gray rug with flecks of white or golden flowers in spring and summer. The grayish leaves are small, the flowers in thick clusters. Popular forms are:
alpestre (serpyllifolium)—Three-inch gray carpet with bright-yellow flowers through June.
montanum—Fragrant gold flowers in June; about eight inches high.
mulfenianum—Smaller (four-inch) version with balls of yellow flowers from May to June.
saxatile—basket of gold—Blooms in May; nine inches high; spreads thickly. Variety compactum is more compact and shorter; about eight inches. Variety citrinum has lemon-yellow flowers.
spinosum—Dense growth, shrubby and spiny, about eight inches high. White flowers sometimes tinged with pink, in June and July.