A hardy, tuberous perennial that runs its year backwards from most garden plants: it flowers in autumn, on bare stems, before the leaves arrive — small, swept-back pink (or white) blooms held just above the ground. The beautifully silver-marbled, ivy-shaped leaves then emerge and carpet the soil through winter and into spring, each tuber's foliage subtly different, before the whole plant goes dormant and disappears for the summer. Native to southern Europe and the Mediterranean (POWO, Kew), it is the most reliable hardy cyclamen for naturalising in dry shade beneath trees and shrubs — one of the hardest spots in any garden — where it builds long-lived colonies from self-sown seed. The tubers are toxic if eaten, so it is grown strictly as an ornamental.