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Hibiscus trionum

Common name:	Flower Of An Hour	Family:	Malvaceae
Author:	L.	Botanical references:	50, 200
Synonyms:
Known Hazards:	None known
Range:	Arid old world tropics. Naturalized in S.E. Europe[50].
Habitat:	Cultivated ground and waste places in S.E. Europe[50].
Edibility Rating (1-5):	2	Medicinal Rating (1-5):	1

Other Possible Synonyms:	From various places across the web, may not be correct. See below.
	Trionum trionum[B,P]
Other Common Names:	From various places around the Web, may not be correct. See below.
	Bladder Ketmia [L], Devil's Head In A Bush [H], Drie-urenbloem [D], Flower Of An Hour [H,P], Flower-of-an-hour [L,B], Quennab [E], Venice Mallow [L],
Systematics:	From a USDA Plants Database
	Order: Malvales. Mallow family
Other Range Info:	From the Ethnobotany Database
	China; Iran; Malaysia; South Africa
Noxious, Invasive and Injurious Weeds	From USDA PLANTS database, Weeds Australia , DEFRA Injurious Weeds
	Listed as noxious/invasive for: Minnesota, Washington.

Physical Characteristics

Annual/Perennial growing to 0.6m by 0.3m at a fast rate. It is hardy to zone 10 and is frost tender. It is in flower from July to August, and the seeds ripen from August to October. The flowers are hermaphrodite (have both male and female organs) and are pollinated by Insects. We rate it 2/5 for edibility and 1/5 for medicinal use.

The plant prefers light (sandy), medium (loamy) and heavy (clay) soils and requires well-drained soil. The plant prefers acid, neutral and basic (alkaline) soils. It cannot grow in the shade. It requires dry or moist soil.

Habitats and Possible Locations

Cultivated Beds.

Edible Uses

Leaves; Root.

Young leaves and young shoots - raw or cooked[177, 179].
Root - it is edible but very fibrousy[144]. Mucilaginous, without very much flavour[144].

Medicinal Uses

Disclaimer

Diuretic; Skin; Stomachic.

The flowers are diuretic[240]. They are used in the treatment of itch and painful skin diseases[240].
The dried leaves are said to be stomachic[240].

Other Uses

None known

Cultivation details

Prefers a well-drained humus rich fertile soil in a sheltered position in full sun[200].
A very ornamental plant[1], it is an annual or short-lived perennial. Not very frost-tolerant, if started off early in a warm greenhouse it can be grown as an annual in Britain, flowering and setting seed in its first year.

Propagation

Seed - sow early spring in a warm greenhouse. Germination is usually fairly rapid. Prick out the seedlings into individual pots when they are large enough to handle. If growing them as annuals, plant them out into their permanent positions in early summer and protect them with a frame or cloche until they are growing away well. If hoping to grow them as perennials, then it is better to grow them on in the greenhouse for their first year and to plant them out in early summer of the following year.
Cuttings of half-ripe wood, July/August in a frame. Overwinter them in a warm greenhouse and plant out after the last expected frosts.

Suppliers

For more details of plant suppliers please see our Suppliers Page which lists many more places to look.

Web References

[H] Details of Scandanavian and European Common names in Henriette's names database
[E] Ethnobotany Data (common names, uses, countries) from the Ethnobotany Database.
[V] Images from the Vascular Plant Image Gallery of the Texas A&M Bioinformatics Working Group.
[W] Photos (common names, range) from the University of Washington Medicinal Herb Garden.
[B] Data (Latin & Common names, other references) from the BONAP's Synonymized Checklist of the Vascular Flora of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.
[G] Data (Common Names, Uses, Distribution) from the USDA/ARS NPGS's GRIN taxonomic database.
[C] Taxon data. from the CalFlora database.
[P] Data. (uses, distribution, wetland) from the USDA'a Plants database.
[HP] Links, Photos, Suppliers from Hortiplex Plant Database

References for the family Malvaceae.

[CHINA] Draft Data Very detailed botanical/identification info. from the Flora of China.

See the PFAF Links Pages for other sources.

Also try Photos and info from the The Plants Database which has 14,000 images.

References

[1] F. Chittendon. RHS Dictionary of Plants plus Supplement. 1956 Oxford University Press 1951
Comprehensive listing of species and how to grow them. Somewhat outdated, it has been replaces in 1992 by a new dictionary (see [200]).

[50] ? Flora Europaea Cambridge University Press 1964
An immense work in 6 volumes (including the index). The standard reference flora for europe, it is very terse though and with very little extra information. Not for the casual reader.

[144] Cribb. A. B. and J. W. Wild Food in Australia. Fontana 1976 ISBN 0-00-634436-4
A very good pocket guide.

[177] Kunkel. G. Plants for Human Consumption. Koeltz Scientific Books 1984 ISBN 3874292169
An excellent book for the dedicated. A comprehensive listing of latin names with a brief list of edible parts.

[179] Reid. B. E. Famine Foods of the Chiu-Huang Pen-ts'ao. Taipei. Southern Materials Centre 1977
A translation of an ancient Chinese book on edible wild foods. Fascinating.

[200] Huxley. A. The New RHS Dictionary of Gardening. 1992. MacMillan Press 1992 ISBN 0-333-47494-5
Excellent and very comprehensive, though it contains a number of silly mistakes. Readable yet also very detailed.

[240] Chopra. R. N., Nayar. S. L. and Chopra. I. C. Glossary of Indian Medicinal Plants (Including the Supplement). Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi. 1986
Very terse details of medicinal uses of plants with a wide range of references and details of research into the plants chemistry. Not for the casual reader.

Readers Comments

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Plant information taken from the Plants For A Future - Species Database. Copyright (c) 1997-2003.
WEB search engine by Rich Morris - Home Page- Contact Info
Blagdon Cross, Ashwater, Beaworthy, Devon, EX21 5DF, UK.
Website: www.pfaf.org Phone: 0845 458 4719/_44(0) 1208 872963

This page (UK) http://www.comp.leeds.ac.uk/cgi-bin/pfaf/arr_html?Hibiscus+trionum
This page (US) http://www.ibiblio.org/pfaf/cgi-bin/arr_html?Hibiscus+trionum

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We make no claims of magical effects or supernatural powers for any item in this catalog. In spite of legendary attributes or occult and craft tradition, such items are offered as curios only and beliefs concerning their magical effectiveness are related only for historical interest.