Description
This perennial shrub grows up to 1,5m and is evergreen, frost hardy and fast growing. It produces attractive, bright, sunny, yellow flowers with deep-red to blackish centres. This decorative, nicely rounded, soft, bushy shrub has large velvet or hairy leaves. The flowers close early in the afternoon and do not re-open. The flowering time is in summer and its flowers for a reasonable length of time. They lure insect pollinators which in turn attract birds. During a famine the flowers are cooked as a pot verb. The root is used to treat small children who have a bloated stomach. Hawk moths, Snow white moth, Spiny bollworm moth and the Orange cotton moth all lay their eggs on this plant. The mystical idea is that it’s a love potion so dried petals are put into love incense and it is used in wedding ceremonies. The name is derived from the Greek hibiskos the name for a ‘marsh-mallow’ and ibis= a stork that fed on some mallow species.