Draba korabensis

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Robert Pavlis

The plant pictured in this post is known in the trade as Draba korabensis – a nice yellow flowering Draba. But is this the right plant?

There is very little information available about this plant on the internet, but I did manage to find a herbarium specimen and a detailed description of the species:

Plant in Bulgaria: http://e-ecodb.bas.bg/rdb/en/vol1/drakorab.html
Herbarium Specimen

Based on this information Draba korabensis has white flowers and quite a long flower scape. The plant pictured here is yellow with a 2 inch flower scape.

This mystery Draba is one of the yellow flowering Drabas that makes a nice bloom display early in the year along with the early daffodils. This early blooming ensures that it is covered with bees who are desperately looking for pollen. After flowering, it forms a nice tight bun of tinny green leaves which makes it very attractive in the rock garden all summer long.

If you leave the finished flower heads on the plant, you will almost certainly get some seed. The plant is easy to grow from seed and it even seeds around a bit. Each seed makes a small plant that very slowly grows into a larger clump. A trick with this kind of plant is to leave several seedlings in the same pot and grow them together into adulthood. That way you get a good sized clump in a year.

The plant in the photos was grown from a seed exchange so it is possible that the name of the plant is incorrect. Keep in mind that the nursery trade does use D. korabensis for this plant so that may be the most likely name you will see if you are trying to obtain the plant. If you can’t find this exact species, try one of the other yellow Drabas – they all seem like nice rock garden plants and all are easy to grow from seed.