Most have fragile-looking flowers and leaves, but can stand some surprisingly dry conditions. Most of our plants are better in partial shade and a moisture-retentive soil when in growth. Colourful tubular flowers, often with exaggerated spurs.
The long spurred flowers contains the nectar and so the resource is reserved primarily for range of long-tongued bumblebees, bee-flies and solitary bees, and especially important in an spring woodland garden. In southern Europe, there are a number of butterflies whose larvae eat the leaves, most notably the clouded apollo, but sadly they do not feature in our fauna. Most of the garden Corydalis have been found growing outside of cultivation, but they are not seen as posing significant ecological threats, even in ancient woodland.