Large and vigorous, but often compact-growing shrubs with smooth and shiny reddish brown bark. The large fragrant flowers are white, often with a yellow blotch and typically frilled or wavy along the outer part of the lobes. Quite variable in terms of blooming season and requiring excellent drainage. Native to S Burma, Laos, Thailand and […]
One of the finest species in the genus. Very large, deep red flowers with black nectar pouches in early spring. The leaves are stunning – deep green in color and quite long with very bristly petioles and margins. A superb foliage plant with equally impressive flowers. This species is best in shade to light shade […]
Rounded evergreen shrubs with ascending bristly branches. Very attractive foliage, shiny and rugulose on the upper surface, with a thick cinnamon brown indumentum on the lower. The fleshy bell-shaped flowers (late winter to mid-spring) are deep red or scarlet to carmine. One of the first species to bloom in the garden each year. This species […]
1964/118 LEO (0\R1\6). Rose (55A) in bud, opening to rose (55B) flowers with darker pink flecks and basal blotching. One of the most amazing flowers in the collection. Large evergreen shrubs or trees, often growing to 100 ft. in the wild, (hence its name, meaning “tree-like”) but rarely over 40 ft. in cultivation. The flowers […]
Rhododendron williamsianum is one of the finest, easiest and most attractive of all species. Rounded leaves, bronzy new growth and delicate rose, bell-shaped flowers on this form from the collection at Caerhays. Easy in sun or shade and relatively drought tolerant once established, this is one of the best all-around species for general garden […]
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Chirita, Briggsia and other genera in the Gesneriaceae The Gesneriaceae (African Violet family) is a large and diverse group of plants in which I have recently taken an interest. Specifically, I have been studying and collecting the various relatively hardy genera to be found growing in the temperate and subtropical regions of the Sino-Himalaya, often […]
Rhododendron ochraceum SEH#080 This red-flowered species is considered by many to be one of the finest of the myriad of new Rhododendron introductions in the modern era of plant hunting. It was introduced into general cultivation in 1995 when Peter Cox and I found it in the Jin Pin Mountains of southern Sichuan Province, […]
Rhododendron huanum Another fantastic new rhododendron introduced from my first expedition to China is the species R. huanum which occurs in scattered populations in the mountains of southern Sichuan, northeastern Yunnan, and adjacent northeastern Guizhou. Although this species has long been known to botanists (it was officially described in 1939), it was never successfully introduced […]
Paeonia mairei SEH#058 This is an herbaceous (dies back to the ground each autumn) species native to the mountains of SW China which is where I found it in the autumn of 1995 while exploring a deep ravine full of wondrous plants. These included giant trees of Rhododendron argyrophyllum with huge, thick trunks, masses of interesting […]
Rhododendron valentinioides SEH#235 This species was first collected and introduced into cultivation from the Laojun Shan, a range of mountains near the city of Wenshan in southern Yunnan Province, China, just north of the Vietnam border. Peter Cox and I were on our very last day in the field at the end of a very […]
Rhododendron sinofalconeri SEH#229 From the mountains on either side of the Yunnan-Vietnam border comes the newly introduced, yellow-flowered, big-leaf Rhododendron sinofalconeri. This species has two very different forms from two separate areas, although each form more or less matches the type description. The form from southern Yunnan north of the Red River was first introduced […]
Agapetes pyrolifolia SEH#1511 This Rhododendron relative represents just one of the many, and definitely one of the finest, species in this large genus that we have introduced into cultivation. Agapetes can be thought of basically as epiphytic, evergreen blueberries with flashy flowers that occur primarily in the temperate rainforests of the Sino-Himalaya. This species was […]
2013 RSF Yearbook ARTICLES INCLUDE: 2011 Expedition to Papua New Guinea by Steve Hootman Species Profile: Rhododendron ponticum by Peter Cox Art Imitating Nature by Charles Lyte Roadside Anatolia by Philip MacDougall Rhododendron Species at Marwood Hill Gardens, Devon, England by Malcolm Pharoah Hunting for Rhododendrons in Northern Vietnam 2011 by Kenneth Cox The Lakeside […]
