
IDS Trees and Shrubs Online depends on generous donations to continue to make reliable information on hardy woody plants freely available to everyone, everywhere.
If you haven’t already, please consider donating to our May Appeal. If everyone who uses TSO during May 2026 gives just £10, we would cover our costs for a whole year, enabling us to accelerate our work!
Kindly sponsored by
Peter Norris, enabling the use of The Rhododendron Handbook 1998
New article for Trees and Shrubs Online.
Recommended citation
'Rhododendron makinoi' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Shrub, 1–2.5 m; young shoots floccose-tomentose; bud scales persistent. Leaves 7–18 × 1–2.5 cm, narrowly lanceolate, apex acute, upper surface glabrous, lower surface with a thick white to fulvous tomentum composed of dendroid hairs; petioles tomentose at first, usually soon glabrescent. Flowers 5–10, in a tight truss; calyx 2–5 mm; corolla 5-lobed, pale rose, with or without flecks, funnel-campanulate, nectar pouches lacking, 30–40 mm; ovary densely whitish to brown-tomentose, style glabrous. Flowering May-June. Royal Horticultural Society (1997)
Distribution Japan Honshu
Habitat to 2,000 m
RHS Hardiness Rating H5
Awards AGM 1993
Conservation status Vulnerable (VU)
Taxonomic note (R. yakushimanum Nakai subsp. makinoi (Tagg) D.F.Chamb.) Royal Horticultural Society (1997)
Allied to R. degronianum but differing in the persistent bud scales and narrower leaves, 7.5–10× as long as broad. Royal Horticultural Society (1997)