Index of Species Information
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
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| Scrambled eggs in Pueblo County, Colorado. Creative Commons photo by Barry Breckling. |
Introductory
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
AUTHORSHIP AND CITATION:
Matthews, Robin F. 1993. Corydalis aurea. In: Fire Effects Information System, [Online].
U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station,
Fire Sciences Laboratory (Producer). Available:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/database/feis/plants/forb/coraur/all.html [].
ABBREVIATION:
CORAUR
SYNONYMS:
Capnoides aureum (Willd.) Kuntze [13]
SCS PLANT CODE:
COAU2
COMMON NAMES:
scrambled eggs
golden corydalis
golden smoke
TAXONOMY:
The currently accepted scientific name of scrambled eggs is Corydalis
aurea Willd. [9,11,20]. The following subspecies are recognized
[12,16,27]:
Corydalis aurea subsp. aurea --racemes generally surpassed by leaves
Corydalis aurea subsp. occidentalis (Engelm.) Ownbey --racemes generally
surpassing leaves
Some authors, however, make this distinction at the varietal level [9,11].
LIFE FORM:
Forb
FEDERAL LEGAL STATUS:
No special status
OTHER STATUS:
Scrambled eggs is classified as threatened in New York. Its
state rank there is listed as S1 (critically imperiled in New York State
because of extreme rarity or is extremely vulnerable to extirpation from
the New York State due to biological factors [29].
DISTRIBUTION AND OCCURRENCE
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
GENERAL DISTRIBUTION:
Scrambled eggs is distributed from Quebec west to Alaska and south
(from east of the Cascade Mountains) to California [14,16,20,28]. In the
central United States it is found to Texas and Missouri. Golden
corydalis also occurs through the New England states to West Virginia
[9,11,12]. Corydalis aurea ssp. occidentalis has more western and
southern distribution than C. aurea spp. aurea [14,11,12].
ECOSYSTEMS:
FRES10 White - red - jack pine
FRES11 Spruce - fir
FRES14 Oak - pine
FRES15 Oak - hickory
FRES17 Elm - ash - cottonwood
FRES18 Maple - beech - birch
FRES19 Aspen - birch
FRES20 Douglas-fir
FRES21 Ponderosa pine
FRES23 Fir - spruce
FRES26 Lodgepole pine
FRES28 Western hardwoods
FRES29 Sagebrush
FRES30 Desert shrub
FRES32 Texas savanna
FRES33 Southwestern shrubsteppe
FRES34 Chaparral - mountain shrub
FRES35 Pinyon - juniper
FRES36 Mountain grasslands
FRES37 Mountain meadows
FRES38 Plains grasslands
FRES39 Prairie
FRES40 Desert grasslands
FRES44 Alpine
STATES:
AK AZ CA CO ID IL IN IA KS MI
MN MO MT NE NV NH NM NY ND OH
OK OR PA SD TX UT VT VA WA WV
WI WY AB BC MB NT ON PQ SK YT
MEXICO
BLM PHYSIOGRAPHIC REGIONS:
4 Sierra Mountains
5 Columbia Plateau
6 Upper Basin and Range
7 Lower Basin and Range
8 Northern Rocky Mountains
9 Middle Rocky Mountains
10 Wyoming Basin
11 Southern Rocky Mountains
12 Colorado Plateau
13 Rocky Mountain Piedmont
14 Great Plains
15 Black Hills Uplift
16 Upper Missouri Basin and Broken Lands
KUCHLER PLANT ASSOCIATIONS:
K011 Western ponderosa forest
K012 Douglas-fir forest
K015 Western spruce - fir forest
K016 Eastern ponderosa forest
K017 Black Hills pine forest
K018 Pine - Douglas-fir forest
K021 Southwestern spruce - fir forest
K023 Juniper - pinyon woodland
K037 Mountain-mahogany - oak scrub
K038 Great Basin sagebrush
K039 Blackbrush
K040 Saltbush - greasewood
K041 Creosotebush
K053 Grama - galleta steppe
K054 Grama - tobosa prairie
K055 Sagebrush steppe
K056 Wheatgrass - needlegrass shrubsteppe
K057 Galleta - three-awn shrubsteppe
K063 Foothills prairie
K064 Grama - needlegrass - wheatgrass
K065 Grama - buffalograss
K066 Wheatgrass - needlegrass
K067 Wheatgrass - bluestem - needlegrass
K070 Sandsage - bluestem prairie
K074 Bluestem prairie
K081 Oak savanna
SAF COVER TYPES:
NO-ENTRY
SRM (RANGELAND) COVER TYPES:
NO-ENTRY
HABITAT TYPES AND PLANT COMMUNITIES:
NO-ENTRY
MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
IMPORTANCE TO LIVESTOCK AND WILDLIFE:
Scrambled eggs produces several alkaloids and may be poisonous to
sheep and cattle [5,16,17].
PALATABILITY:
Scrambled eggs is unpalatable to horses, sheep, and cattle [6].
NUTRITIONAL VALUE:
Scrambled eggs is poor in energy and protein value [6].
COVER VALUE:
NO-ENTRY
VALUE FOR REHABILITATION OF DISTURBED SITES:
NO-ENTRY
OTHER USES AND VALUES:
NO-ENTRY
OTHER MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS:
NO-ENTRY
BOTANICAL AND ECOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
GENERAL BOTANICAL CHARACTERISTICS:
Scrambled eggs is a winter annual or biennial forb. It is highly
branched with stems usually 4 to 20 inches (10-50 cm) tall, but becoming
prostrate with age [11,12,20]. Leaves are one to four times pinnately
compound [12,20,28]. Flowers are borne in racemes. The fruits are
capsules with seeds about 0.08 inches (0.2 cm) in diameter [11,20].
Scrambled eggs has a slender taproot [5,28].
RAUNKIAER LIFE FORM:
Hemicryptophyte
Therophyte
REGENERATION PROCESSES:
Scrambled eggs reproduces by long-lived, wind-dispersed seed
[2,4,6,15]. Seeds may lie dormant for over 160 years [15].
SITE CHARACTERISTICS:
Scrambled eggs grows on open prairies and hillsides, along streams and
rocky banks or shores, and in open woodlands [9,11,12,13,26]. It is
also often found on disturbed sites such as along roads, in clearings,
and around gravel or sand pits [7,22,26,27]. It grows well on moderate
to steep slopes [6]. Scrambled eggs grows in moist to dry,
well-drained rocky, gravelly, or sandy soil [6,14]. Lower and upper
elevational limits of scrambled eggs in a few western states are as
follows:
Feet Meters
Arizona 1,500-9,500 454-2,878 [16]
California 5,000-7,500 1,515-2,272 [20]
Colorado 5,000-10,500 1,515-3,181 [13]
Utah 2,640-11,071 800-3,355 [28]
SUCCESSIONAL STATUS:
Obligate Initial Community Species
Scrambled eggs usually appears in communities following disturbance
and dies out within a few years if conditions are stable [26].
SEASONAL DEVELOPMENT:
Depending on latitude, scrambled eggs generally flowers from May to
June or July [9,11,12,14,20]. In Arizona, however, it blooms from
February to June [16].
FIRE ECOLOGY
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
FIRE ECOLOGY OR ADAPTATIONS:
Scrambled eggs reproduces from long-lived seeds. It may also invade
recently burned areas by wind-dispersed seed [2]. Germination of seeds
of other corydalis species (C. sempervirens) is stimulated by fire [25].
Anderson [1] stated that scrambled eggs regenerates vegetatively
following fire, but no specific information was given.
FIRE REGIMES:
Find fire regime information for the plant communities in which this
species may occur by entering the species name in the FEIS home page under
"Find Fire Regimes".
POSTFIRE REGENERATION STRATEGY:
Ground residual colonizer (on-site, initial community)
Initial-offsite colonizer (off-site, initial community)
FIRE EFFECTS
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
IMMEDIATE FIRE EFFECT ON PLANT:
Scrambled eggs is probably always killed by fire.
DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF FIRE EFFECT:
NO-ENTRY
PLANT RESPONSE TO FIRE:
Scrambled eggs quickly invades recently burned areas by seed.
However, its survival in the postfire community appears to be very short
lived.
Scrambled eggs invaded recently burned areas by wind-dispersed seed
after stand-replacing summer fire in lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta)
stands in Colorado. It was not present in adjacent unburned stands, but
in burned areas it had a frequency of 27.9 percent in the first postfire
year. By the second postfire year, frequency had diminished to 9.7
percent, and it was thereafter eliminated from the postfire community
[2]. Scrambled eggs was also present 1 year after moderate-severity
fires in lodgepole stands in Yellowstone National Park. Information for
response after postfire year 1, however, was not given [1].
Scrambled eggs bloomed and set seed in the first growing season
following severe fire in Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii)/ninebark
(Physocarpus malvaceus) habitats in western Montana. However, it had
almost completely disappeared from the postfire community by the second
growing season. The origin of the postfire seedlings was unknown, but
it may have been soil-stored seed [4].
Scrambled eggs flowered the August following a May fire in black
spruce (Picea mariana)-white spruce (P. glauca) stands in Alaska [15].
No additional information was given.
DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF PLANT RESPONSE:
NO-ENTRY
FIRE MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS:
NO-ENTRY
REFERENCES
SPECIES: Corydalis aurea
REFERENCES:
1. Anderson, Jay E.; Romme, William H. 1991. Initial floristics in
lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta) forests following the 1988 Yellowstone
fires. International Journal of Wildland Fire. 1(2): 119-124. [16008]
2. Barth, Richard C. 1970. Revegetation after a subalpine wildfire. Fort
Collins, CO: Colorado State University. 142 p. Thesis. [12458]
3. Bernard, Stephen R.; Brown, Kenneth F. 1977. Distribution of mammals,
reptiles, and amphibians by BLM physiographic regions and A.W. Kuchler's
associations for the eleven western states. Tech. Note 301. Denver, CO:
U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management. 169 p.
[434]
4. Crane, M. F.; Habeck, James R.; Fischer, William C. 1983. Early postfire
revegetation in a western Montana Douglas-fir forest. Res. Pap. INT-319.
Ogden, UT: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Intermountain
Forest and Range Experiment Station. 29 p. plus chart. [710]
5. Dayton, William A. 1960. Notes on western range forbs: Equisetaceae
through Fumariaceae. Agric. Handb. 161. Washington, DC: U.S. Department
of Agriculture, Forest Service. 254 p. [767]
6. Dittberner, Phillip L.; Olson, Michael R. 1983. The plant information
network (PIN) data base: Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, Utah, and
Wyoming. FWS/OBS-83/86. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Interior,
Fish and Wildlife Service. 786 p. [806]
7. Dorn, Robert D. 1988. Vascular plants of Wyoming. Cheyenne, WY: Mountain
West Publishing. 340 p. [6129]
8. Eyre, F. H., ed. 1980. Forest cover types of the United States and
Canada. Washington, DC: Society of American Foresters. 148 p. [905]
9. Fernald, Merritt Lyndon. 1950. Gray's manual of botany. [Corrections
supplied by R. C. Rollins]. Portland, OR: Dioscorides Press. 1632 p.
(Dudley, Theodore R., gen. ed.; Biosystematics, Floristic & Phylogeny
Series; vol. 2). [14935]
10. Garrison, George A.; Bjugstad, Ardell J.; Duncan, Don A.; [and others].
1977. Vegetation and environmental features of forest and range
ecosystems. Agric. Handb. 475. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of
Agriculture, Forest Service. 68 p. [998]
11. Gleason, H. A.; Cronquist, A. 1963. Manual of vascular plants of
northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. Princeton, NJ: D. Van
Nostrand Company, Inc. 810 p. [7065]
12. Great Plains Flora Association. 1986. Flora of the Great Plains.
Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas. 1392 p. [1603]
13. Harrington, H. D. 1964. Manual of the plants of Colorado. 2d ed.
Chicago: The Swallow Press Inc. 666 p. [6851]
14. Hitchcock, C. Leo; Cronquist, Arthur. 1964. Vascular plants of the
Pacific Northwest. Part 2: Salicaceae to Saxifragaceae. Seattle, WA:
University of Washington Press. 597 p. [1166]
15. Juday, Glenn P. 1985. The Rosie Creek Fire. Agroborealis. 17(1): 11-20.
[19881]
16. Kearney, Thomas H.; Peebles, Robert H.; Howell, John Thomas; McClintock,
Elizabeth. 1960. Arizona flora. 2d ed. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press. 1085 p. [6563]
17. Kingsbury, John M. 1964. Poisonous plants of the United States and
Canada. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 626 p. [122]
18. Kuchler, A. W. 1964. Manual to accompany the map of potential vegetation
of the conterminous United States. Special Publication No. 36. New York:
American Geographical Society. 77 p. [1384]
19. Lackschewitz, Klaus. 1991. Vascular plants of west-central
Montana--identification guidebook. Gen. Tech. Rep. INT-227. Ogden, UT:
U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Intermountain Research
Station. 648 p. [13798]
20. Munz, Philip A. 1973. A California flora and supplement. Berkeley, CA:
University of California Press. 1905 p. [6155]
21. Raunkiaer, C. 1934. The life forms of plants and statistical plant
geography. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 632 p. [2843]
22. Rosie, Rhonda. 1991. Range extensions and rare vascular plants from
southeastern Yukon Territory. Canadian Field-Naturalist. 105(3):
315-324. [18205]
23. Stickney, Peter F. 1989. Seral origin of species originating in northern
Rocky Mountain forests. Unpublished draft on file at: U.S. Department of
Agriculture, Forest Service, Intermountain Research Station, Fire
Sciences Laboratory, Missoula, MT; RWU 4403 files. 7 p. [20090]
24. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Soil Conservation Service. 1982.
National list of scientific plant names. Vol. 1. List of plant names.
SCS-TP-159. Washington, DC. 416 p. [11573]
25. Viereck, Leslie A.; Schandelmeier, Linda A. 1980. Effects of fire in
Alaska and adjacent Canada--a literature review. BLM-Alaska Tech. Rep.
6. Anchorage, AK: U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land
Mangement, Alaska State Office. 124 p. [7075]
26. Voss, Edward G. 1985. Michigan flora. Part II. Dicots
(Saururaceae--Cornaceae). Bull. 59. Bloomfield Hills, MI: Cranbrook
Institute of Science; Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Herbarium.
724 p. [11472]
27. Weber, William A. 1987. Colorado flora: western slope. Boulder, CO:
Colorado Associated University Press. 530 p. [7706]
28. Welsh, Stanley L.; Atwood, N. Duane; Goodrich, Sherel; Higgins, Larry
C., eds. 1987. A Utah flora. Great Basin Naturalist Memoir No. 9. Provo,
UT: Brigham Young University. 894 p. [2944]
29. Young, Stephen M., editor. 1992. New York state rare plant status list.
August 1992. Latham, NY: Department of Environmental Conservation,
Division of Lands and Forests, Natural Heritage Program. 79 p. [22563]
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