Purple Saxifrage is a hardy alpine that signals the coming of spring in Scotland. It is one of the country's earliest flowering natives, often blossoming between February and March - sometimes even while still partially encased in snow and ice! A relic of the last ice age, it has evolved to tolerate high exposure, extreme cold, and a lack of natural pollinators. It is found clinging to damp, base-rich cliffs in the Highlands, but because it relies on a frigid alpine environment, it is highly sensitive to rising global temperatures.
In Gaelic culture, there is a myth that saxifrage held the magical and medicinal ability to break down stones. As it grows out of tight fractures in the rockface, ancient plant observers believed it must be the plant itself physically or magically breaking apart mountain rock. In traditional medicine, Purple Saxifrage was brewed as a tea or tincture thought to dissolve and cure urinary tract and kidney stones.
