''Ipomoea nil'' is a species of ''

Ipomoea ''Ipomoea'' () is the largest genus in the plant family Convolvulaceae, with over 600 species. It is a large and diverse group, with common names including morning glory, Ipomoea aquatica, water convolvulus or water spinach, sweet potato, ...

'' morning glory known by several common names, including picotee morning glory, ivy morning glory, ivy-leaf morning glory, and Japanese morning glory (although it is not native to Japan). It is native to the tropical Americas, and has been introduced widely across the world.

Description

Native to

Central America Central America is a subregion of North America. Its political boundaries are defined as bordering Mexico to the north, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest. Central America is usually ...

and

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

, the plant is a climber with twining stems up to 5 m long and is dense to scattered with long hairy

trichomes Trichomes (; ) are fine outgrowths or appendages on plants, algae, lichens, and certain protists. They are of diverse structure and function. Examples are hairs, glandular hairs, scales, and papillae. A covering of any kind of hair on a plant ...

. The finely hairy,

emerald green Varieties of the color green may differ in hue, chroma (also called saturation or intensity) or lightness (or value, tone, or brightness), or in two or three of these qualities. Variations in value are also called tints and shades, a tint ...

leaves are

ovate Ovate may refer to: * Ovate (egg-shaped) leaves, tepals, or other botanical parts *Ovate, a type of prehistoric stone hand axe * Ovates, one of three ranks of membership in the Welsh Gorsedd * Vates or ovate, a term for ancient Celtic bards ...

to almost circular, 5 to 14 cm long. The base is heart-shaped, the edge is entire or lobed three to five times, the leaf lobes are pointed or tapering. The species, especially its wild form, is extremely similar to ''

Ipomoea hederacea ''Ipomoea hederacea'', the ivy-leaved morning glory or Kaladana, is a flowering plant in the bindweed family. The species is native to tropical parts of the Americas, and has more recently been introduced to North America. It now occurs there ...

''. The funnel-shaped, colorful flowers (blue to reddish-purple, with whitish tube) are quite showy and are individually up to five in often dense

cymose In botany, an inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a plant's stem that is composed of a main branch or a system of branches. An inflorescence is categorized on the basis of the arrangement of flowers on a main axis ( p ...

groups, in which fully developed flowers and developing buds stand together. The wild forms are smaller than cultivated forms, and are almost always blue; the cultivated forms come in a wide variety of colors. They open in the morning and close by the afternoon. The long, thorny hairy sepals have a length of 15 to 25 mm, they are long,

lanceolate The following terms are used to describe leaf plant morphology, morphology in the description and taxonomy (biology), taxonomy of plants. Leaves may be simple (that is, the leaf blade or 'lamina' is undivided) or compound (that is, the leaf blade ...

, and have a linear-lanceolate tip. The

crown A crown is a traditional form of head adornment, or hat, worn by monarchs as a symbol of their power and dignity. A crown is often, by extension, a symbol of the monarch's government or items endorsed by it. The word itself is used, parti ...

is blue, purple, or almost scarlet red. The throat is often colored white. The crown tube has a length of 3 to 5 cm, the crown hem has a width of 4 to 5 cm. The fruits are almost spherical to spherical capsule fruits with a diameter of 8 to 12 mm. The seeds are pear-shaped and densely covered with short trichomes.

Cultivation

It is cultivated as an

ornamental plant Ornamental plants or ''garden plants'' are plants that are primarily grown for their beauty but also for qualities such as scent or how they shape physical space. Many flowering plants and garden varieties tend to be specially bred cultivars th ...

in many places, and the descendants of garden escapees now grow wild. Fast-growing and self-seeding, it may be used to hide unsightly fences or walls, and may also be used decoratively on trellises. The flowers are several centimeters wide and appear in various shades of blue, pink or rose, often with white stripes or edges or blends of colors. Common

cultivar A cultivar is a kind of Horticulture, cultivated plant that people have selected for desired phenotypic trait, traits and which retains those traits when Plant propagation, propagated. Methods used to propagate cultivars include division, root a ...

s include 'Scarlet O'Hara', 'Early Call', and 'Rose Silk'. Hybrids, for instance with '' I. purpurea'', have been developed. Some of these have been given the name ''I. x imperialis'' (Imperial Japanese morning glory), which is not official. Cultivars include 'Sunrise Serenade'. Alternative nomenclatures include ''Ipomoea nil x imperialis'', as in 'Cameo Elegance', or ''Ipomoea nil'' 'Imperialis'. It is a

frost Frost is a thin layer of ice on a solid surface, which forms from water vapor that deposits onto a freezing surface. Frost forms when the air contains more water vapor than it can normally hold at a specific temperature. The process is simila ...

tender annual in colder areas or if placed in shaded area in the garden, but can be kept as a perennial if it is well managed and placed in full sun during the winter.

Morning glories in Japan

Morning glories Morning glory (also written as morning-glory) is the common name for over 1,000 species of flowering plants in the family Convolvulaceae, whose taxonomy and systematics remain in flux. These species are distributed across numerous genera, inc ...

are popular in Japan. They are believed to have been introduced there directly from

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

in the

Heian period The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kammu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means in Japanese. It is a ...

of the 8th to 9th centuries. During the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

of the 17th to 19th centuries, as more people started to live in cities, a fad for growing potted morning glories of different colors and sizes swept through the country. The pots are often equipped with cylindrical structures called ''andon shitate'' (), which look like Japanese lanterns at night. In early summer, morning glory markets are held in large cities in Japan, where merchants and hobbyists sell the flowers. The largest of such markets is the Iriya Morning Glory Market (Japanese: 入谷朝顔市, July 6–8), held along the roads surrounding Shingenji Temple, commonly called "Iriya Kishibojin", in Iriya, Taito-ku, Tokyo.All About Iriya Asagao (Morning Glory) Market/Festival: how to get to, schedule & souvenirs
(Tokyo Direct Diary)

Gallery

File:Totoiriyaasagao hiroshige.jpg, "Morning Glories in Iriya, Eastern Capital" (1866), No 28 of "The Thirty-six Selected Flower Scenes" by

Hiroshige II was a Japanese designer of ukiyo-e art. He inherited the name Hiroshige II following the death in 1858 of his master Hiroshige, whose daughter he married. In 1865 he moved from Edo to Yokohama after dissolving his marriage and began using ...

File:Asagao Festival 002.JPG, The Iriya Morning Glory Market, Tokyo (2008) File:牽牛花 Ipomoea nil 20210321102223 01.jpg, Growing in the wild File:牽牛花 Ipomoea nil 20210321102223 02.jpg, Growing in the wild

References

External links