Arabis Koehleri

This very rare, tough, tufted endemic lives only on a few dry hills, high above the rushing Umpqua River on the Pacific coast of Oregon. Cruciform flowers of bright purple open on compact, rounded shrubby domes which cling tenaciously to the rocky outcrops. In 2001, to reduce chances of extinction, researchers grew hundreds of plants in the Berry Botanic Garden greenhouse using seeds collected from the wild. During the autumn rains, researchers battled the slippery slopes and clung to the steep cliffs to place plants and directly sow seeds into appropriate habitat near existing Koehler's rockcress plants. Very few seeds available from cultivated plants.