Rhododendron pemakoense Kingdon-Ward

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Credits

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

Recommended citation
'Rhododendron pemakoense' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/rhododendron/rhododendron-pemakoense/). Accessed 2024-03-19.

Genus

Synonyms

  • R. patulum Kingdon-Ward

Infraspecifics

Other taxa in genus

Glossary

calyx
(pl. calyces) Outer whorl of the perianth. Composed of several sepals.
corolla
The inner whorl of the perianth. Composed of free or united petals often showy.
style
Generally an elongated structure arising from the ovary bearing the stigma at its tip.
apex
(pl. apices) Tip. apical At the apex.
article
(in Casuarinaceae) Portion of branchlet between each whorl of leaves.
corolla
The inner whorl of the perianth. Composed of free or united petals often showy.
flush
Coordinated growth of leaves or flowers. Such new growth is often a different colour to mature foliage.
glabrous
Lacking hairs smooth. glabrescent Becoming hairless.
glaucous
Grey-blue often from superficial layer of wax (bloom).
obtuse
Blunt.

Credits

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

Recommended citation
'Rhododendron pemakoense' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/rhododendron/rhododendron-pemakoense/). Accessed 2024-03-19.

Prostrate or erect dwarf shrub, to 0.3 m; young growth scaly and pubescent. Leaves 1.7–2.6 × 0.6–1.3 cm, obovate or obovate-elliptic, apex rounded, margin revolute, entire, lower surface densely covered with unequal scales that are golden when young, becoming brown, the larger of which have undulate rims. Flowers 1–2, in a terminal inflorescence; calyx lobes oblong, 2.5–4 mm, not ciliate; corolla pink to pale purplish mauve, funnel-campanulate, 24–30 mm, tube 13–18mm, outer surface densely pilose and sparsely scaly; stamens 10; ovary scaly, style impressed, decimate, pubescent, scaly or glabrous at base, longer than stamens. Flowering March-April. Royal Horticultural Society (1997)

Distribution  China SE Tibet India Arunachal Pradesh

Habitat 2,900–3,050 m

RHS Hardiness Rating H5

Awards AM 1933 (Sir John Ramsden, Bulstrode, Gerrards Cross) from Kingdon-Ward 6301; flowers white, suffused mauve externally.

Conservation status Vulnerable (VU)

Taxonomic note The markedly unequal leaf scales and the larger corolla will distinguish this species from the allied R. uniflorum. Royal Horticultural Society (1997)

A dwarf evergreen shrub with scaly and sometimes shortly downy young stems. Leaves obovate or oblong-obovate, obtuse to rounded at the apex, 12 to 118 in. long, 14 to 12 in. or slightly more wide, dark green and slightly scaly above, the undersides glaucous and dotted with brown scales spaced up to one-and-a-half times their own diameter apart; petioles up to 18 in. or slightly more long. Flowers solitary or in pairs, terminal, on stalks up to 34 in. long at flowering-time, lengthening in fruit. Calyx small, scaly. Corolla five-lobed, widely funnel-shaped, 2 to 214 in. wide, purplish pink, scaly and hairy outside. Stamens ten, hairy at the base. Style slender, straight, usually glabrous, sometimes with a few scales or hairs at the base. (s. Uniflorum)

R. pemakoense was found by Kingdon Ward in fruit in 1924 during his winter journey through the Tsangpo gorge in the Tibetan province of Pemako, and was described by him in 1930 from the plants raised from the seeds he collected (KW 6301). Most of the seeds came from plants which he found on November 30 ‘on cliffs up the glens above the Tsangpo gorge, on Namcha Barwa and Sanglung’. But a small proportion was collected some days earlier at Pemakochung, and Kingdon Ward later came to doubt whether the specimens he collected in these two localities really represented the same species. There appears to be no record of any rogues having appeared from KW 6301, but it may be that the variation of R. pemakoense in cultivation, such as it is, is due to the fact that the seeds came from two localities.

R. pemakoense is one of the most delightful of dwarf rhododendrons, making a low, densely branched mound which, weather permitting, flowers so freely in March or April that almost every leaf is concealed by its large corollas. Unfortunately, the buds are liable to be killed by frost once they start to show colour. According to James Comber, a plant at Nymans, raised from the original seeds, bore 120 flowers in 1931, when six years old (Gard. Chron., Vol. 89 (1931), p. 375). In a later article he remarked that some plants there spread by underground runners, an unusual feature in Rhododendron.

An Award of Merit was given to R. pemakoense on April 24, 1928, when Sir John Ramsden showed a pan of seedlings a few inches high, bearing flowers described as white with a lilac flush outside, which is not the characteristic colour of the species and suggests that the pan may have come from a greenhouse. The plants were shown under the field number, as the species had not then been named.

From the Supplement (Vol. V)

In this species Dr Cullen includes R. patulum, mentioned on page 687 under R. imperator. It was placed there for the reason stated, and it should be added that Mr Davidian now submerges it in R. imperator altogether. This difference of opinion is, however, a matter only for botanists, since it is agreed that plants grown as R. patulum are R. pemakoense.

For R. uniflorum, mentioned under R. pemakoense, see this supplement, in alphabetical order.


R uniflorum Hutch. & Ward

This species was described in 1930 from specimens collected by Kingdon Ward on the Doshong La, S.E. Tibet, at the end of June 1924 (KW 5876). He collected seeds in the following autumn. R. uniflorum is so like R. pemakoense that Cowan and Davidian were able to find only one difference that might be relied on, namely that in R. uniflorum the scales on the undersides of the leaves are more widely spaced, being three to six times their own diameter apart. If the two were united it would have to be under the name R. uniflorum, which has a few months’ priority, but they decided to retain R. pemakoense as a separate species provisionally. It should be added that the type-localities of the two species are not much more than 10 miles apart as the crow flies.