Phyllodoce aleutica (Spreng.) Heller

A dwarf evergreen shrub 5 to 9 in. high, the young shoots entirely hidden by the leaves. Leaves linear, tapered at the base, bluntish at the apex, finely toothed, 3⁄8 in. long, 1⁄16 in. wide, bright green above, yellowish-green beneath with a white line down the centre; very shortly stalked. Flowers nodding, each on a downy glandular stalk 1⁄2 to 11⁄2 in. long, several of them produced in May near the top of the shoot. Corolla yellowish white, corrugated, pitcher-shaped, 1⁄4 in. wide, contracted at the top to an orifice 1⁄16 in. wide; stamens enclosed in the corolla, their stalks white, glabrous; anthers pink; ovary globose, glandular; style glabrous. Sepals five, lanceolate, pointed, 1⁄8 in. long, pale at the margins, very hairy where they join the stalk. Bot. Mag., n.s., t. 496.

Native of Japan, Sakhalin, the Kuriles, the Aleutians, and W. Alaska; described in 1825, but always rare in cultivation. It is allied to P. glanduliflora, which takes its place in north-western N. America. Suitable for a cool damp spot in the rock garden and a pretty plant, though scarcely equal in beauty to P. breweri, P. nipponica or P. × intermedia. It received an Award of Merit when shown by Messrs Marchant in 1939. A plant in their nursery near Wimborne, Dorset, attained a width of 21⁄2 ft in only five years.