Abutilon megapotamicum

Abutilon megapotamicum is the trailing one of the flowering maples, a slender, half-vining deciduous shrub that drapes and clambers rather than standing stiffly upright. Its species name means "of the big river," for the Rio Grande basin of southern Brazil where it grows wild, and like the rest of its tribe it belongs not to the maples its leaves suggest but to the mallow family, in company with hibiscus and hollyhock.

The flowers are its whole charm: curious hanging lanterns, each a swollen red calyx from which a skirt of yellow petals and a dark tuft of stamens protrude, swinging along the branches from late summer well into fall. Hummingbirds and bees find them readily. A Victorian favorite for the conservatory and the hanging basket, it has never quite gone out of fashion among gardeners who like a plant that does something unexpected.

It can be used in several ways: left to spill several feet across a bed in a single season, trained up a support or trellis, or planted in a basket where the lanterns can dangle. Give it full sun to part shade and well-drained soil. In zone 8 it behaves as a dieback shrub, cut down by frost and returning from the base; in warmer zones it holds more of its frame.

Site it where the hanging flowers can be read at eye level or above, against a wall, over the edge of a raised bed, or from a basket on the porch, where its long season of quirky bloom can be enjoyed up close.