Abelia R.Br.

Commemorating Dr Clark Abel (1780–1826), British author, physician and botanical collector in China.

Evergreen or semi-deciduous, medium-sized, arching shrubs. Leaves opposite or in 3s, simple, entire or toothed; stalks short. Flower clusters axillary or terminal. Sepals 2-5, persistent. Corolla tubular to bell-shaped with 5 lobes, the tube curved or straight, sometimes swollen at the base. Stamens 4, in 2 pairs and attached at the base of the flower tube. Ovary inferior, 3-chambered. Fruit a leathery 1-seeded achene with persistent sepals at the tip.

Soft and hardwood cuttings.

Stamens 4; fruit an achene without a bristly tip, cf. Kolkwitzia.

30 species from E Asia to the Himalaya and Mexico.

Source: Spencer, R. (2002). Caprifoliaceae. In: Spencer, R.. Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 4. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 3. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.

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Hybrid cultivar

Abelia 'Edward Goucher'

A semi-deciduous shrub with foliage like A. ×grandiflora but leaves in 3s on young shoots, larger flowers that are darker, mauvish to orange with an orange-yellow throat, and with sepals often fused in pairs; summer and autumn.

A hybrid selection from the cross, A. ×grandiflora × A. schumannii, raised at the Glenn Dale Plant Introduction Station, Maryland, USA, in 1911.

kingdom Plantae
phylum   Tracheophyta
class    Magnoliopsida
superorder     Asteranae
order      Dipsacales
family       Caprifoliaceae
Higher taxa
Subordinate taxa
species         Abelia ×grandiflora (André) Rehder
species         Abelia parvifolia
species         Abelia triflora Wallich