A prostrate evergreen shrub 1 to 3 in. high but 1 to 3 ft wide; shoots dense, slender, closely covered with tiny appressed ovate, glabrous leaves, and altogether (leaves with stem) only about 1⁄12 in. wide. The leaves resemble those of C. mertensiana in having no groove down the back and thereby differ from those of C. selaginoides. Flowers pendent, solitary, axillary, white, bell-shaped and lily-of-valley-like, 1⁄4 in. long, the stalks thread-like, 1⁄2 to 1 in. long; opening in May and June, with sometimes a supplementary crop in autumn; stamens ten. Bot. Mag., n.s., t. 298.
Native of high altitudes in Japan and thence northward to Alaska. A very beautiful little shrub, rare in cultivation, but occasionally offered by nurserymen. It likes cool, moist conditions, a peaty soil and shade during the middle of the day.
cv. ‘Rigida’. – Larger in most of its parts, with the corolla more cylindrical and corolla lobes longer and proportionately narrower than in the type. Introduced from Japan around 1935. (C. l. var. major Stoker).
For the hybrid ‘Muirhead’, see C. wardii. C. lycopodioides has also crossed with C. fastigiata to give ‘Randle Cooke’ and ‘Badenoch’.