Spiraea prunifolia Sieb. & Zucc. var. simplicifolia Nakai

Horticultural & Botanical History

The single-flowered form simplicifolia was introduced some years after plena.  It is considered it to be of little horticultural merit compared with flore plena.  ‘China throughout, Japan and Corea.  The original description in Sieb. et Zucc. Fl. Jap. p. 131 is written from a plant with double flowers which is very common in Japan proper.  No specimen with simple flowers has ever been represented here at Tokyo.  I thought this simple flowered plant to be a new species which has a close affinity to S. prunifolia Sieb. et Zucc.  But I am quite convinced by Mr. T. Makino that the specimen is nothing but a simple flowered form of the common Japanese species.  Mr. Palibin has also written in his Conspectus Fl. Ivorere I. p. 73 that the Corean species has all simple flowers, while those of Japan and China are all double flowered form.’  [Icones Plantarum Formosanarum Fasc. I, p.221/1911-21].

History at Camden Park

Plants were obtained from the Sydney Botanic Garden on 17th October 1853 [RBGS AB]. 

Notes