Virginia sweetspire,
Itea virginica L., is a deciduous shrub that has horticultural selections for
redder fall color and longer spikes of white flowers.Surprisingly it is virtually ignored
considering that a local nursery recently had a clearance on plants not being
sold and these were $2 for a 2-3 gallon pot.You can hardly even get an empty pot the same size much less fill it
with potting soil for that price.Maybe
I’m just biased towards native plants where often the more obscure it is the better, but it unfortunately seems that this is one that would only sell when either in bloom or fall color (where it appeared unlikely to have really needed a better color selection for cultivation other than as an excuse to justify charging a higher price),
which is how I saw it the first time when I took a dendrology
class in the fall semester.
Usually binomial scientific names
and/or higher the classifications are stable, but due to recent genetic studies many
of them are now changing; therefore, they have to be relearned.In this case the family classification was changed
by separating out the woody members of the Saxifrage family resulting in sweetspire with both currants and gooseberries, Ribes L., being put
in a new family together while Hydrangea L. became the type genus of a new family that includes Decumaria L. and Philadelphus L. (thus as is often the case it is probably just an excuse for some nontenured professor(s) to get published).
