Oplopanax horridus
Credits
Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Oplopanax horridus' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Synonyms
- Panax horridus Sm.
- Echinopanax horridus (Sm.) Decne. & Planch. ex Harms
- Fatsia horrida (Sm.) Hemsl.
A deciduous shrub up to 10 ft high in the wild, its stems, leaf-stalks, leaf-veins, and inflorescence all armed with slender needle-like prickles. Leaves 7 to 10 in. wide, palmately veined, cordate at the base, shallowly seven- or nine-lobed, doubly serrated; leaf-stalks about as long as the blade. Flowers very shortly stalked or almost sessile, borne in dense umbellate heads, which are arranged in elongated racemes or panicles up to 10 in. long. Fruits red. Bot. Mag., t. 8572.
Native of north-western N. America, in the moister types of forest, where it forms dense entanglements; discovered by Menzies on Nootka Sound during Vancouver’s voyage 1790–5. The date of introduction is uncertain.
If one judged from the climate in which this species is naturally found, it ought to thrive in this country. But owing to the warm soft weather we frequently experience in the early New Year, it starts into growth too soon, and is almost invariably cut by frost when grown in the open, and might succeed better in moist woodland.
