Field of Science

Friday Fabulous Flower - Tea



It's November 11th and TPP still sat on his patio yesterday for a cocktail after moving a few hundred pounds of leaves.  Some bibb lettuce, mustard greens, bok choi, dill are still in our gardens, but it may well frost tonight. This won't hurt the above mentioned items (if covered), but it's time to turn to the glasshouse for flowers to post about each Friday. 
At any rate here's a nice picture of a smallish tea shrub in flower just after it got misted. It used to be called Thea sinensis, but that species has now been submerged into the genus Camellia, so C. sinensis. Admittedly this flower is not as gaudy as its cultivated cousins.  It falls into the TPP category of large flowers because it is more than 1" in diameter.  The leaves of this evergreen shrub are the source of the caffeine beverage tea. 

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