The great spring set-piece of the Southern garden. Azaleas and rhododendrons cover themselves in bloom so completely that for a few weeks the shrub disappears behind the flowers, then settle back into quiet, useful evergreen and deciduous shapes.
'Great Balls of Fire' belongs to the celebrated line of Aromi azaleas, the life's work of Dr. Eugene Aromi, a University of South Alabama education professor who set out in the late 1960s simply to help the azaleas in his Mobile front yard survive the Gulf Coast's brutal heat and humidity. What began as a backyard experiment grew into one of the great American breeding programs. From 1971 onward Aromi crossed cold-hardy Exbury and Knap Hill azaleas with tough southern native species, chief among them the Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, chasing large, fragrant, heat-proof deciduous flowers. He made more than a thousand crosses and raised over fifty thousand seedlings before his death in 2004, and roughly a hundred of the best were named. This is counted among them.
Sunbow Solar Flare is the patented name for the azalea catalogued as Rhododendron 'QbackB' (U.S. Plant Patent 27,083), a deciduous native hybrid bred for the very conditions that defeat most azaleas. The plant traces to a deliberate cross made in 1984 by Robert Edward Lee in Folsom, Louisiana, who set out to combine the fragrance and vivid color of the Gulf Coast's own Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, with the substance of the Exbury hybrids. A seedling from austrinum open-pollinated with the hybrid 'Gibraltar' was crossed onto 'Chetco', and from that union Lee selected this standout in 1990.
'Aromi Sunrise' is a deciduous azalea from the storied breeding program of Dr. Eugene Aromi, the University of South Alabama professor who spent decades teaching heat-shy azaleas to flourish along the Gulf Coast. Introduced in 1987, this hybrid marries the bold Knap Hill azalea 'Hiawatha' with the native Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, so the plant inherits both the size and clarity of the English strains and the toughness and fragrance of a southern wildflower. The result is exactly what Aromi chased across more than a thousand crosses: a large-flowered, sweet-scented, heat-tolerant azalea for gardens where the classic mountain sorts fail.
'Aromi Sunstruck' is one of the deciduous azaleas raised by Dr. Eugene Aromi, the Mobile educator whose decades of patient hybridizing gave the Deep South a whole race of heat-tolerant azaleas. Beginning in the late 1960s, Aromi crossed the large, brilliant Exbury and Knap Hill strains with hardy southern natives, above all the Florida azalea, Rhododendron austrinum, to win big, fragrant flowers on shrubs that could take Gulf Coast summers. He described more than fifty thousand seedlings over a lifetime of work and named only the finest hundred or so; 'Aromi Sunstruck' carries that pedigree of selection.
Rhododendron alabamense, the Alabama azalea, is one of the loveliest and, by wide agreement, one of the most powerfully fragrant of all the wild deciduous azaleas of the Southeast. The species grows in hardwood forests and along dry slopes and ridges from north-central Alabama east through western Georgia and into South Carolina, where in mid spring the woods fill with the scent of lemon. Clusters of six to ten white, funnel-shaped flowers, each marked with a clear yellow blotch and finished with long, arching stamens, open just before or alongside the emerging leaves. The genus name Rhododendron means rose tree in Greek, while azalea derives from azaleos, meaning dry, a nod to the well-drained upland ground these shrubs favor.
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.
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.
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.
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.
'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.
