Royal azalea
Rhododendron schlippenbachii · Ericaceae · 철쭉
How to spot it
Leaves cluster in fives at the branch tips, and pale pink flowers open together with the leaves.
Look
- Leaves
- Obovate with a slightly notched tip, 5-8 (10) cm long and 3-6 cm wide. Pale green and hairy on the veins beneath, with smooth margins; the leaf stalk is 2-5 mm.
- Flowers
- Opens together with the leaves from late April to early June and is fragrant. The corolla is funnel-shaped, pale red, 5-8 cm across, with reddish-brown spots on the upper petals.
- Fruit
- The capsule is long elliptic-ovate, 1.5 cm long, with glandular hairs, maturing in October-November.
- Bark
- Bark is pale yellow-brown and hairless. One-year-old twigs have glandular hairs that later disappear, and turn gray-brown.
Where it grows
- In Korea
- Native
- Native to
- Also found in southern Liaodong in China, Inner Mongolia and the Russian Far East; in Korea it grows nationwide.
- Ecology
- Grows in forests or on bare ground on ridges. A shade-tolerant plant that likes acidic, humus-rich, fertile places; strong in cold and against salt wind, but weak in soil adaptability and drought tolerance.