A modern reference to temperate woody plants, including updated content from this site and much new material, can be found at Trees and Shrubs Online.

Staphylea colchica Stev.

Modern name

Staphylea colchica Steven

A deciduous shrub, 6 to 10 ft high, with stiff, erect branches. Leaves composed of three or five leaflets, which are ovate-oblong, 212 to 312 in. long, nearly or quite glabrous, shining beneath, the margins set with fine, rather bristle-like teeth, the terminal leaflet is stalked, the lateral ones stalkless. Flowers in erect panicles terminating the young shoots and lateral twigs, the largest up to 5 in. long, and as much wide, each flower 34 in. long and wide, the sepals spreading, narrow oblong, very pale green; petals white, erect, narrow, recurved at the tips. Fruit a two- or three-celled inflated capsule, 3 to 4 in. long, 2 in. wide, the apex of each division ending in a long, fine point. Seeds 13 in. long, pale brown. Flowers in May. Bot. Mag., t. 7383.

A native of the S.W. Caucasus; introduced to Britain shortly before 1879. It is the handsomest of the staphyleas, allied to the more western and more widely distributed S. pinnata, but distinguishable from it in leaf by the shining lower surface, and in fruit by the much larger capsules. It received a First Class Certificate when shown by Messrs Veitch in 1879.

var. kochiana Medved. – Filaments of stamens hairy (said to be glabrous in the type).

S. ‘Coulombieri’. – A deciduous shrub of vigorous habit, considered by some to be a hybrid between S. colchica and S. pinnata, by others a variety of the former. The leaves are composed of three or five leaflets, which are larger than in either of the reputed parents, the terminal one often 5 to 6 in. long; they are ovate-oblong, toothed, dark green on both sides, and very lustrous beneath. Flowers white, and intermediate in size between those of the parents; the panicles are not so large as in S. colchica, the blossoms more compact, and the sepals and petals wider and shorter. The fruit is intermediate in size, being a two- or three-celled capsule, 112 to 2 in. long, the seeds rather larger. (S. × coulombieri André; S. colchica var. coulombieri (André) Zab.).

This handsome shrub was first noticed as showing hybrid characters in the nursery of Coulombier, at Vitry, in France, in 1887. It had been obtained by him from the famous arboretum of Segrez in 1872, beyond which date its history is unknown. But it may well have originated there as a chance hybrid. It is most closely related to S. colchica, especially in the shining green under-surface of the leaves, but the much smaller fruits and the differences in the sepals and petals distinguish it.

S. ‘Grandiflora’. – A very distinct form with much longer, laxer panicles, and larger individual flowers; the leaflets are rather longer than in ordinary S. ‘Coulombieri’, but proportionately narrower (S. colchica f. grandiflora Zab.; S. coulombieri var. grandiflora (Zab.) Bean; S. × elegans Hort. ex A. T. Johnson, not Zab.).

S. ‘Hessei’. – Leaflets mostly five, sometimes three, slenderly pointed. Flowers in more or less pendulous panicles. Sepals rose-coloured, especially at the apex. Petals stained deep pink at the base. Very free-flowering. Raised by Messrs Hesse of Weener, Hannover, some years before 1898. It was considered by Zabel to be a hybrid between S. colchica var. coulombieri (see ‘Coulombieri’) and S. pinnata and named by him S. × elegans var. Hessei. The typical S. × elegans of Zabel was not a plant raised by himself, as has been erroneously stated. He received it in 1871 from the Flottbeck Nurseries, Hamburg, as S. colchica, and described it as a rather tender shrub with the habit of S. pinnata, mostly five leaflets, large pink-flushed flowers in ovate panicles, not freely borne and rarely developing fruits. He judged it to be a hybrid between S. colchica and S. pinnata (the earlier named S. × coulombieri André was considered by Zabel not to be a hybrid between these two species but a variety of the former; see above). Whether the supposedly hybrid S. elegans is in cultivation it is impossible to say; the plant sometimes grown under the name appears to be S. ‘Grandiflora’.


Genus

Staphylea

Other species in the genus