Lonicera x 'Mandarin

The honeysuckle on our arbor is in full flower now.  It's a sterile hybrid, developed by the University of British Columbia Botanical Garden in the late 1980's, now patented as Lonicera x 'Mandarin.'

It's a hybrid of Lonicera tragophylla, a native of China, and Lonicera x brownii 'Dropmore Scarlet,' which is, itself, a hybrid of Lonicera sempervirens, our eastern United States native, and Lonicera hirsuta, a native honeysuckle from the upper Midwestern United States.

Here it is flowering today.  Beautiful.

 

Interestingly, we're currently trying to root cuttings of Lonicera x brownii "Dropmore Scarlet"  -- it's a dead ringer for our southern native Lonicera sempervirens, one of its parents.  A cross with Lonicera hirsuta, it's hardy here and quite lovely in the few places that we've seen it.