Caprifoliaceae

Honeysuckle Family

By: George Rogers

The Caprifoliaceae are one of the few chiefly temperate-zone families in the present manual. A small family, there are about 14 genera and 400 species (BA1). Caprifoliaceae are woody, often shrubby; they have usually opposite, simple, stipule-less leaves (pinnately compound in Sambucus), and tubular flowers having inferior ovaries. This is the family of true honeysuckles (Lonicera, not Tecoma, which is in the Bignoniaceae), viburnums, weigelas, and elderberries (Sambucus).

Key to Caprifoliaceae Cultivated in South Florida

1. Leaves pinnately compound…Elderberry (Sambucus canadensis, a common native species not often cultivated and not treated in the Manual)

1. Leaves simple…2

2. Vines; flowers red…Coral Honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens)

2. Shrubs; flowers white…3

3. Leaves <1.5” long…Walter Viburnum (Viburnum obovatum)

3. Leaves >1.5” long…4

4. Leaves with rough upper surface, smelling like bacon when crushed; petal-tube longer than the lobes, the tube cylindric-conic…Sandankwa Viburnum (Viburnum suspensum)

4. Leaves with smooth upper surface, not smelling like bacon; corolla tube bowl-shaped…Sweet Viburnum (Viburnum odoratissimum)