Lespedeza bicolor Turcz.

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Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Lespedeza bicolor' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/lespedeza/lespedeza-bicolor/). Accessed 2024-03-28.

Glossary

calyx
(pl. calyces) Outer whorl of the perianth. Composed of several sepals.
appressed
Lying flat against an object.
glabrous
Lacking hairs smooth. glabrescent Becoming hairless.
leaflet
Leaf-like segment of a compound leaf.
midrib
midveinCentral and principal vein in a leaf.
ovate
Egg-shaped; broadest towards the stem.
raceme
Unbranched inflorescence with flowers produced laterally usually with a pedicel. racemose In form of raceme.
trifoliolate
With three leaflets.

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Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Lespedeza bicolor' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/lespedeza/lespedeza-bicolor/). Accessed 2024-03-28.

A deciduous shrub becoming in some climates a bush 8 or 10 ft high, although at Kew its stems are only annual and grow from 3 to 7 ft high during the season, dying down to ground-level every winter. Leaves trifoliolate, slender-stalked; leaflets varying in size from 34 to 2 in. in length by about two-thirds as much wide, broadly oval or obovate, the midrib enlongated into a small terminal bristle, the middle leaflet is larger and longer stalked than the others, all being dark green above, pale beneath, and clothed sparsely on both sides with appressed hairs or glabrous above. Racemes slender stalked, 2 to 5 in. long, produced in the leaf-axils from the uppermost 2 ft of the stem. Flowers rosy-purple, less than 12 in. long, confined to the terminal part of the raceme. Calyx 16 in. long, hairy, the teeth not so slender and sharp-pointed as in L. thunbergii. Pods ovate, downy, 13 in. long, one-seeded.

Native of Manchuria, N. China, and Japan; introduced to Europe by Maximowicz, the Russian botanist, in 1856. It is not so handsome and desirable a plant as L. thunbergii, with which it has been much confounded. In countries with a hotter summer than ours, the stems made each year do not die back more than half their length, and the plant thus increases gradually in height. In the Arnold Arboretum, Mass., it forms a bush comparable with a colutea. Flowers in August and September.

From the Supplement (Vol. V)

† cv. ‘Summer Beauty’. – Flowers borne over a long period in late summer (early July to late September). It makes a spreading shrub to about 5 ft high, which should be pruned in spring, but not to ground level. Raised in Holland (Dendroflora No. 19, p. 88 (1932)).

† cv. ‘Yakushima’. – Of dwarf habit, to about 1 ft high, with smaller leaves and flowers.