A plant of Helleborus foetidus, the Stinking Hellebore, after a night of hard frost. The picture shows a plant that has lost turgour; both the flowering stems and the foliage have wilted. The white edges to the leaves are small ice crystals.In order to remain turgid, a plant must absorb soil moisture via its root system. This water is drawn upwards by evaporation at the stomatal pores on the underside of the leaves. It can disrupted by a lack of soil moisture, causing plants to wilt in hot dry weather. Low temperatures also inhibit the uptake of soil moisture, resulting in the wilting shown here. Such wilting is a normal response and is reversible. Within an hour of this picture being taken, the plant was fully upright again.H. foetidus is native to Western Europe. It is a statuesque hardy perennial garden plant that flowers from late December in the UK