Rhododendron rosie posie with peach coloured flowers.
Rhododendron (from the Greek: rhodos, "rose", and dendron, "tree") is a genus of flowering plants in the family Ericaceae. It is a large genus with over 1000 species and most have showy flower displays. It includes the plants known to gardeners as azaleas. The Rhododendron is a genus characterized by shrubs and small to (rarely) large trees, the smallest species growing to 10-20 cm tall, and the largest, R. arboreum, reported to 12 m tall. The leaves are spirally arranged; leaf size can range from 1-2 cm to over 50 cm, exceptionally 100 cm in R. sinogrande. They may be either evergreen or deciduous. In some species the underside of the leaves are covered with scales (lepidote) or hairs (indumentum). Some of the best known species are noted for their many clusters of large flowers. There are alpine species with small flowers and small leaves, and tropical species such as section Vireya that often grow as epiphytes. Rhododendron is a very widely distributed genus, occurring throughout most of the Northern Hemisphere except for dry areas, and extending into the Southern Hemisphere in southeastern Asia and northern Australasia. The highest species diversity is found in the Sino-Himalayan mountains from central Nepal and Sikkim east to Yunnan and Sichuan, with other significant areas of diversity in the mountains of Indo-China, Korea, Japan and Taiwan. In addition, there are a significant number of tropical rhododendron species from southeast Asia to northern Australia, with 55 known species in Borneo and 164 in New Guinea. [1] Relatively fewer species occur in North America and Europe. Rhododendrons have not been found in South America or Africa. The species are organized by subgenus, section, subsection and series. These are currently divided into four large and four small subgenera: * Subgenus Rhododendron L.: small leaf or lepidotes (with scales on the underside of their leaves); several hundred species, type: Rhododendron ferrugineum. The tropical r
Size: 5256px × 3504px
Location: Ireland
Photo credit: © Shane Phelan / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
Keywords: botanic, close, color, coloured, deep, depth, dof, double, dublin, ericaceae, field, flowers, foilage, garden, gardens, glasshouse, green, nature, peach, pink, posie, red, rhododendron, rich, rosie, semi, shallow, stem, tangerine, yellow
