''Linnaea chinensis'', synonyms ''Abelia chinensis'' and ''Abelia rupestris'', commonly known as ''Chinese Abelia'' (Chinese: ,

Pinyin Hanyu Pinyin (), often shortened to just pinyin, is the official romanization system for Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin Chinese in China, and to some extent, in Singapore and Malaysia. It is often used to teach Mandarin, normally writte ...

: ''Nuò mǐ tiáo''), is a

semi-evergreen Semi-deciduous or semi-evergreen is a botanical term which refers to plants that lose their foliage for a very short period, when old leaves fall off and new foliage growth is starting. This phenomenon occurs in tropical and sub-tropical woody spe ...

, densely branched shrub with dark green foliage. It is a species of

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (), commonly called angiosperms. The term "angiosperm" is derived from the Greek words ('container, vessel') and ('seed'), and refers to those plants th ...

in the honeysuckle family

Caprifoliaceae The Caprifoliaceae or honeysuckle family is a clade of dicotyledonous flowering plants consisting of about 860 species, in 33, to 42 genera, with a nearly cosmopolitan distribution. Centres of diversity are found in eastern North America an ...

Description

It is a compact deciduous shrub with reddish stems and glossy, small leaves that become reddish-brown before autumn. Its simplified-form flowers are funnel-shaped, white, and its pink

sepal A sepal () is a part of the flower of angiosperms (flowering plants). Usually green, sepals typically function as protection for the flower in bud, and often as support for the petals when in bloom., p. 106 The term ''sepalum'' was coine ...

s remain long after flowering. As long as the plant continues to make new growth during the summer, it will continue to flower. It is one of the most cold-resistant species within the genus.

Taxonomy

It was described by Robert Brown in 1818, and transferred to the genus ''

Linnaea ''Linnaea'' is a plant genus in the honeysuckle family Caprifoliaceae. Until 2013, the genus included a single species, ''Linnaea borealis''. In 2013, on the basis of molecular phylogenetic evidence, the genus was expanded to include species f ...

'' in 1872, although this move was not widely accepted until 2013.

Distribution

The plant inhabits South Central China and Southeast China, as well as

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...

and the

Ryukyu Islands The , also known as the or the , are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest from Kyushu to Taiwan: the Ōsumi, Tokara, Amami, Okinawa, and Sakishima Islands (further divided into the Miyako and Yaeyama Islands), with Yona ...

in Japan. ''Linnaea chinensis'' is commonly cultivated in China and is also used elsewhere.E.g., The cultivar 'China Rose' has gained the

Royal Horticultural Society The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), founded in 1804 as the Horticultural Society of London, is the UK's leading gardening charity. The RHS promotes horticulture through its five gardens at Wisley (Surrey), Hyde Hall (Essex), Harlow Carr (Nor ...

's Award of Garden Merit. A garden hybrid between ''L. chinensis'' and '' L. uniflora'' was once thought to be only a variety of ''L. chinensis'' and was known, under the synonym ''Abelia rupestris'', as ''A. rupestris'' var. ''grandiflora''. It is now ''Linnaea'' × ''grandiflora''.

References

{{Taxonbar, from1=Q17437032, from2=Q160081 Caprifoliaceae Flora of China Flora of Japan Flora of Taiwan Garden plants Least concern plants Plants described in 1818 Taxa named by Robert Brown (botanist, born 1773) Taxa named by Alexander Braun Taxa named by Georg Carl Wilhelm Vatke