Five Leaf Akebia

A graceful vine with fragrant dark-coloured flowers in spring. The fruits are rarely produced in cultivation and are edible.

A hybrid between this species and Akebia trifoliata (Thunb.) Koidz (with 3 leaflets only) is called Akebia pentaphylla (Mak.) Mak. (with 3-5 leaflets).

No specimens are known from Rhode Island.

A fast-growing, invasive vine whose aggressiveness may at times approach that of Lonicera japonica , Akebia quinata is occasionally planted as an ornamental; it is of more botanical than horticultural interest. A greenish to whitish flowered variant, known from Asia, is cultivated in North America. The edible, though allegedly insipid, fruits are apparently uncommon in cultivation; cross pollination appears to be necessary for their development (C. S. Sargent 1891).

The roots, stems, and fruits are used medicinally.

A tall climber, climbing up to 6 m. or more, branched, glabrous. Leaves digitate, long stalked; leaflets 5, ovate, obovate to obovate-oblong or elliptic, 3-6 cm. long, emarginate at apex, glabrous, glaucous beneath. Racemes axillary monoecious. Flowers fragrant, females slightly larger and with longer pedicels than males. Female flowers purplish-brown, 2.5-3 cm. in diam. with broad elliptic sepals. Male flowers rosy-purple, much smaller. Fruit 6-10 (-12) cm. long, purple-violet, with glaucous bloom.

Plants , deciduous to semi-evergreen, climbing to 12 m, glabrous. Leaves: petiole 1.6-12.5 cm; leaflets mostly 5, petiolules 0.2-2.2 cm, blades oblong to ovate-elliptic, 0.7-8.2 × 0.4-4.2 cm, base rounded, margins entire, apex retuse. Inflorescences pendent, 4.5-12 cm; pedicel with basal bracts. Flowers fragrant. Staminate flowers 4-15 per inflorescence, 1.2-1.6 cm diam.; sepals oblong to ovate or elliptic, 5-9 mm; stamens 4-5 mm. Pistillate flowers (0-)1-5 per inflorescence, 2-3 cm diam.; sepals elliptic to ovate or nearly orbiculate, 10 16­mm; pistils 3-7, 1 or more maturing. Follicles glaucous, violet to dark purple, oblong, 5-15 cm. Seeds black, ovoid, embedded in whitish pulp.

Woody climbers, deciduous. Stems grayish brown, slender, cylindric; lenticels prominent, small, orbicular. Winter bud outer scales imbricate, pale red-brown. Petiole slender, 4.5--10 cm; petiolules slender, 0.8--1.5(--2.5) cm; leaflets (3--)5(--7), obovate to obovate-elliptic, papery, abaxially glaucous, adaxially dark green, base rounded to broadly cuneate, apex rounded and usually emarginate and cuspidate; lateral leaflets 2--5 × 1.5--2.5 cm; terminal leaflet 2.5--5(--7) cm. Racemes fascicled, 6--12 cm; bracts imbricate, scaly; peduncle ca. 2.5 cm, axillary on short branches. Flowers slightly fragrant. Male flowers: 4--8 (--11). Pedicel slender, 7--10 mm. Sepals 3(--5), pale purple, occasionally pale green or white, broadly cucullate-ovate, 6--8 × 4--6 mm, apex rounded. Stamens 6(or 7), straight at first, incurved at length; filaments very short; anthers oblong. Pistillodes 3--6, small. Female flowers: pedicel slender, 2--4(--5) cm. Sepals dark purple, occasionally green or white, broadly elliptic to suborbicular, 1--2 × 0.8--1.5 cm. Staminode 6--9. Carpels 3--6(--9). Fruit purplish at maturity, straight or slightly incurved, oblong to ellipsoid, 5--8 × 3--4 cm. Seeds ovoid-oblong, compressed, pulp white; seed coat brown to black, shiny. Fl. Apr--May, fr. Jun--Aug.

Distribution: Native of China, Japan and Korea etc.; cultivated elsewhere.

introduced; Conn., Ga., Ind., Ky., Md., Mass., Mich., N.J., N.Y., N.C., Ohio, Pa., Va., W.Va.; native, Asia.

Anhui, Fujian, Henan, E Hubei, E Hunan, Jiangsu, N Jiangxi, Shandong, Sichuan, Zhejiang [Japan, Korea].

Fl. Per. April-May.

Flowering spring, fruiting fall (Sep-Oct).

Waste places, open woodlands; 0-400m.

Forest margins along streams, scrub on mountain slopes; 300--1500 m.

Rajania quinata Houttuyn, Nat. Hist. 11: 366, plate 75, fig. 1. 1779

Rajania quinata Houttuyn, Nat. Hist. 11: 366. 1779; Akebia micrantha Nakai; A. quinata var. polyphylla Nakai; A. quinata var. yiehii W. C. Cheng.