Flora of North America species comparison

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Clematis terniflora

Clematis baldwinii

sweet autumn clematis, sweet autumn virginsbower, yam-leaf clematis, yam-leaf virgin's-bower

pine-hyacinth, pine-woods clematis
Stems

climbing with tendril-like petioles and leaf rachises, 3-6 m.

erect, 2-6 dm, nearly glabrous to moderately pilose.
Leaves

blade pinnately 3- or 5-foliolate;

leaflets ovate or broadly lanceolate to narrowly deltate, to 6.5 × 3.5 cm, margins entire;

surfaces abaxially glabrous or very sparingly appressed-strigose on major veins.

blade unlobed or 2-3-lobed, occasionally divided into 3-5 leaflets;

leaflet blades or lobes linear to narrowly elliptic-lanceolate, or unlobed leaf blades elliptic to ovate, 1.5-10 × 0.2-2.5(-3.5) cm, thin, not prominently reticulate;

surfaces glabrous, not glaucous.
Inflorescences

axillary, 3-12-flowered cymes or compound cymes or paniculate with cymose subunits.

terminal, flowers solitary;

bracts absent or sometimes distal pair of leaves smaller, bractlike.
Flowers

bisexual, often some unisexual (staminate) in same inflorescence;

pedicel 1-3.5 cm, slender;

sepals wide-spreading, not recurved, white, linear or elliptic to lanceolate or narrowly obovate, 0.9-2.2 cm, length ca. 2-3 times width, abaxially tomentose along margins, adaxially glabrous;

stamens ca. 50;

filaments glabrous;

staminodes absent;

pistils 5-10.

narrowly bell-shaped;

sepals uniformly violet-blue, oblong-lanceolate, 2-5.5 cm, margins narrowly expanded distally to ca. 1 mm wide, thin, crispate, proximally tomentose, glabrous where expanded, distally ± tomentose, tips acuminate, spreading to recurved, abaxially glabrous.
Achenes

broad, flat, conspicuously rimmed, minutely appressed-silky, sometimes sparsely so;

beak 2-6 cm.

bodies long-pubescent;

beak 6-10 cm, plumose.
2n

= 16.

Clematis terniflora

Clematis baldwinii
Phenology Flowering summer (Jul–Sep). Flowering all year.
Habitat Roadsides, thickets, and other secondary sites, edges of woods near creeks Sandy, flat pine woods
Elevation 0-1000 m (0-3300 ft) 0-50 m (0-200 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AL; AR; CT; FL; GA; IL; IN; KS; KY; LA; MA; MD; MO; MS; NC; NE; NH; NJ; NY; OH; OK; PA; SC; TN; TX; VA; WV; ON; native to Asia (China, Korea, Japan) [Introduced in North America]
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
from FNA
FL
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Clematis terniflora is commonly cultivated as an ornamental. It is widely naturalized in the eastern United States. The name C. paniculata J. F. Gmelin was incorrectly used for this species by Thunberg in 1794.

Some authors have recognized two or more varieties in this species, correlated with their distribution in Asia, but in the study by H.Hara (1975), all of the varietal names were reduced to synonymy.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

The long peduncles (10-30 cm) elevating the flowers well above the leaves are unique to Clematis baldwinii among the simple-leaved species of Clematis subg. Viorna in the flora. Broad-leaved, large-flowered plants have been segregated as C. baldwinii var. latiuscula, but many intermediates connect the extremes, and flower size is not well correlated with leaf shape. As noted by C. S. Keener (1975), leaf shape appears to be uncorrelated with distribution; collections from a single population often include broad- and narrow-leaved plants.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Source FNA vol. 3. FNA vol. 3.
Parent taxa Ranunculaceae > Clematis > subg. Clematis Ranunculaceae > Clematis > subg. Viorna
Sibling taxa
C. addisonii, C. albicoma, C. baldwinii, C. bigelovii, C. catesbyana, C. coactilis, C. columbiana, C. crispa, C. drummondii, C. fremontii, C. glaucophylla, C. hirsutissima, C. lasiantha, C. ligusticifolia, C. morefieldii, C. occidentalis, C. ochroleuca, C. orientalis, C. pauciflora, C. pitcheri, C. recta, C. reticulata, C. socialis, C. tangutica, C. texensis, C. versicolor, C. viorna, C. virginiana, C. vitalba, C. viticaulis, C. viticella
C. addisonii, C. albicoma, C. bigelovii, C. catesbyana, C. coactilis, C. columbiana, C. crispa, C. drummondii, C. fremontii, C. glaucophylla, C. hirsutissima, C. lasiantha, C. ligusticifolia, C. morefieldii, C. occidentalis, C. ochroleuca, C. orientalis, C. pauciflora, C. pitcheri, C. recta, C. reticulata, C. socialis, C. tangutica, C. terniflora, C. texensis, C. versicolor, C. viorna, C. virginiana, C. vitalba, C. viticaulis, C. viticella
Synonyms C. dioscoreifolia, C. dioscoreifolia var. robusta, C. maximowicziana C. baldwinii var. latiuscula, Viorna baldwinii
Name authority de Candolle: Syst. Nat. 1: 137. (1817) Torrey & A. Gray: Fl. N. Amer. 1: 8. (1838)
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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