Rhododendron arborescens, the sweet or smooth azalea, is one of the hardiest and most graceful of the native white azaleas, a tall, loosely branched deciduous shrub of the eastern mountains and piedmont. The common name smooth azalea points to the hairless, glossy twigs and leaves that set the species apart from woollier kin, while sweet azalea speaks to the flowers, which pour out a rich heliotrope perfume. The species epithet arborescens is Latin for becoming tree-like, a fair description of an old plant that can reach ten to eighteen feet, and the genus name Rhododendron means rose tree in Greek.
Rhododendron atlanticum, the coastal or dwarf azalea, is a low, colony-forming native of the open pine woods and sandy flatwoods of the mid-Atlantic and Carolina coastal plain. Unlike the tall wild azaleas of the mountains, this species stays close to the ground, often no higher than the knee, and spreads by underground runners, or stolons, into broad, drifting colonies. The bluish, glaucous foliage is a hallmark, cool and sea-gray, and the species name atlanticum simply marks the plant's home along the Atlantic seaboard. The genus name Rhododendron means rose tree in Greek; azalea comes from azaleos, meaning dry, a fitting root for a shrub of sandy, well-drained ground.
This fragrant deciduous azalea is a garden cross between two native species, the low, glaucous-leaved coast azalea, Rhododendron atlanticum, and the golden Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum. From the first parent the hybrid inherits sweet fragrance and cool foliage; from the second, warmth of color and vigor. The result, selected here for pale, clear yellow flowers, blends the best of both, and where the ranges of the two species meet along the Southern coastal plain, such crosses occasionally arise in the wild as well.
Rhododendron austrinum, the Florida azalea, is among the earliest and most powerfully fragrant of all the wild deciduous azaleas of the Deep South. Native to the Florida Panhandle, southern Georgia, southern Alabama, and into Mississippi, the species haunts open pine woods, ravine slopes, and river bluffs, often growing in sandy, acidic ground beneath tall longleaf pines. The species name austrinum simply means southern, a fitting label for an azalea so at home in the Gulf Coast heat, and the genus name Rhododendron means rose tree in Greek.
Rhododendron austrinum 'Don's Variegated' is a rare variegated form of the native Florida azalea, carrying the wild flame azalea of the Gulf states but brushed with a fine tracing of gold along each leaf edge. The selection was discovered by Don Jacobs, the noted Georgia plantsman behind Eco-Gardens in Decatur, who found among seedlings of R. austrinum a plant whose foliage held light even before the flowers arrived. Variegation is uncommon in the native azaleas, which makes this a genuine collector's plant.
'Millie Mac' is a wild-selected native azalea from the damp hollows of Escambia County, Alabama, where Floyd McConnell found this plant as a distinctive limb sport on a wild shrub and propagated it for a beauty all its own. Related to the Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, the selection shows white-margined flowers that hint at a touch of R. canescens in the background, and the lineage remains a matter of pleasant debate among native-azalea growers.
'Reagan' is a richly colored selection of the Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, chosen in the wild in Florida near the Apalachicola River, the great blackwater river whose ravines shelter some of the Southeast's rarest plants. Where the typical Florida azalea runs to clear gold and orange, this form pairs yellow petals with deep reddish-pink buds and flower tubes, so that from a distance the whole shrub takes on a warm, red-flushed glow uncommon in the species.
'Varnadoe's Moonbeam' is a luminous early-spring selection of the Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, prized for a soft, glowing color less common in the species. Rather than the fiery orange of many forms, the flowers open in clear golden yellow brushed with apricot and orange in the throat, over reddish tubes, a warm but refined coloring that seems to catch and hold the light, moonlit rather than blazing, against the still-bare spring woodland.
This is a rare and radiant selection of the Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, chosen for flowers of pure, clear yellow. Where the species usually runs to golden-orange, this form holds a clean, buttery, luminous yellow, a color that lights up the spring woodland like sunshine slipping through the canopy. For gardeners and collectors who love the native azaleas, a truly pure-yellow austrinum is an uncommon prize.
'Admiral Semmes' is the best known and easiest to grow of the Dodd nurseries' Confederate Series of azaleas, a deciduous hybrid built for the Deep South's heat and humidity. The cross joins the native Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, with the large-flowered Exbury hybrid 'Hotspur Yellow', and was raised at Dodd and Dodd Nurseries in Semmes, Alabama. The plant takes its name from the Confederate admiral Raphael Semmes, and went on to win the Georgia Gold Medal in 2007.
'Colonel Mosby' is among the most arresting of the Dodd nurseries' Confederate Series of native azaleas, a deciduous hybrid raised at Dodd and Dodd Nurseries in Semmes, Alabama. The cross, made by Bob Schwindt, joins the golden Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, with the large-flowered Exbury hybrid 'Hotspur Yellow', and the plant takes its name from John Singleton Mosby, the Confederate cavalry commander known as the Gray Ghost.
'Stonewall Jackson' is one of the Dodd nurseries' celebrated Confederate Series of deciduous native azalea hybrids, introduced by Tom Dodd Jr. and Tom Dodd III of Semmes, Alabama. The plant is a cross between the Exbury azalea 'Hotspur Yellow' and the native Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, uniting the size and substance of the English hybrids with the fragrance and Gulf Coast toughness of the wild Southern species.
This native azalea is a hybrid of two well-loved wild species, the Cumberland azalea, Rhododendron bakeri, of the southern Appalachians, and the swamp azalea, Rhododendron viscosum, of wet woodland edges across the East. From the Cumberland azalea the cross takes warm color and a rounded, ball-shaped truss; from the swamp azalea, whose name viscosum means sticky, for the glandular, clammy surface of the flowers, the hybrid takes adaptability to humid ground and a late season of bloom. The genus name Rhododendron means rose tree in Greek.
Flame azalea is the showiest of all the native azaleas, and the one that stops hikers in their tracks on the Appalachian balds each June. The large, funnel-shaped flowers open in a fiery range that runs from clear yellow through gold and apricot to blazing orange and scarlet, carried in loose trusses just as the new leaves expand. For all that color the flowers are, unusually, without scent, but nothing about a flame azalea in full bloom feels the lack.
Rhododendron canescens, the Piedmont azalea, is very likely the most widespread of all the wild deciduous azaleas of the Southeast, ranging through the Piedmont, coastal plain, and stream edges from the mid-Atlantic to the Gulf. Country people have long called the plant the Southern pinxter or simply wild honeysuckle, for the sweet, honeysuckle-like scent of the flowers. The species name canescens means becoming gray or hoary, a reference to the soft gray down that coats the undersides of the leaves and the new growth.
'Clyo Red' is a striking red-flowered selection of the native Piedmont azalea, Rhododendron canescens, a species usually seen in soft pink and white. Here the wild pink is deepened to a rich cherry-red, an uncommon and eye-catching tone among the native azaleas, carried on the same fragrant, early-spring frame that makes the Piedmont azalea so beloved. The name points to Clyo, a small community in Effingham County, Georgia, near the plant's Southern home.
'Varnadoe's Pink' is a choice dark-pink selection of the native Piedmont azalea, Rhododendron canescens, chosen and grown by the late Aaron Varnadoe of Colquitt, Georgia, a great native-azalea grower and genuine Southern character. Where the wild species varies from pale to deep pink, this selection holds a rich, abundant dark pink, and the plant has become a popular favorite for that reliable color and a good habit and foliage. The selection is sometimes sold under the name 'Varnadoe's Phlox Pink'.
'Chapmanii Wonder' is an uncommon and rewarding evergreen rhododendron, the offspring of an inspired cross made by a Japanese breeder between two very different parents. From the endangered Florida native Chapman's rhododendron, Rhododendron chapmanii, the plant inherits broadleaf evergreen foliage and Deep South heat tolerance; from the hardy white-flowered form of Rhododendron dauricum, a species of northeastern Asia, the plant takes cold hardiness and early bloom. The species name dauricum points to Dauria, the region of southeastern Siberia where that parent grows wild, while chapmanii honors Alvan Wentworth Chapman, the nineteenth-century botanist of the Southern flora.
Rhododendron colemanii, the Red Hills azalea, is one of the most recently recognized of all the native deciduous azaleas, first described as a distinct species only in 2008. For years the plant was folded in with the Alabama azalea, Rhododendron alabamense, which blooms earlier and holds consistently white, yellow-blotched flowers; the Red Hills azalea, by contrast, flowers later and in a wider range of color. The species takes its home ground from the Red Hills country of the inner coastal plain, a narrow range across southwest Georgia and southern Alabama.
The Oconee azalea is the flame azalea of the lowlands, and for a Southern gardener that difference matters. Where the mountain flame azalea pines for cool Appalachian summers, this Piedmont cousin was born to the heat, thriving in the clay hills and stream bluffs of middle Georgia and South Carolina and taking the humidity of the Deep South in stride. The reward is the same fire in the flower: bright orange to orange-red trusses, sometimes shading to salmon or gold, opening in mid-spring.
