Hibiscus

This is a popular genus of cultivated plants with showy, large flowers.

1. Plants shrubby; flowers predominantly purplish (in escapes).

H. syriacus

1. Plants herbaceous; flowers yellow, white, or pink.

2. Leaf blades (at least the upper) deeply lobed to the base, glabrate or with scattered hairs beneath; calyx and bractlets with mostly long bristly hairs (especially on nerves and margins); petals ca. 1.7–2.6 cm long, yellow with purple base; capsule hairy; low, branched tap-rooted, annual weed of disturbed places.

H. trionum

2. Leaf blades more shallowly if at all lobed, in common species velvety-pubescent beneath; calyx and bractlets minutely but densely stellate-pubescent, without bristly hairs; petals ca. 4.5–8 (–9) cm long, pink (or white); capsule glabrous; erect perennials of moist ground.

3. Leaves glabrous on blades.

H. laevis

3. Leaves velvety-pubescent on blades beneath.

H. moscheutos