Flora of North America species comparison

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Clematis vitalba

Clematis socialis

evergreen clematis, old-man's beard, Traveler's-joy, Traveler's-joy clematis, white virgin's-bower

Alabama leather-flower
Stems

climbing with tendril-like petioles and leaf-rachises, to 12 m. Leaf blade pinnately 5-foliolate;

leaflets cordiform, 8 × (2-)3-5(-6) cm, margins entire to regularly crenate or dentate;

surfaces abaxially minutely pubescent on veins, adaxially glabrous.

erect, not viny, 0.2-0.3(-0.5) m, glabrous or slightly pubescent, arising from horizontal, branching rhizomes and forming patches.
Leaves

proximal simple, blades unlobed or 2-3-lobed, distal blades 1-pinnate;

leaflets and unlobed blades linear-elliptic to narrowly lanceolate or oblanceolate, (3-)4-12(-15) × (0.3-)0.5-1(-1.5) cm, thin, not prominently reticulate;

surfaces abaxially nearly glabrous to sparsely villous on veins, not glaucous.
Inflorescences

axillary and terminal, (3-)5-22-flowered cymes.

terminal, flowers solitary;

bracts absent.
Flowers

bisexual;

pedicel 1-1.5 cm, slender;

sepals wide-spreading, not recurved, white to cream, elliptic or oblanceolate to obovate, ca. 1 cm, length ca. 2 times width, abaxially and adaxially tomentose;

stamens ca. 50;

filaments glabrous;

staminodes absent;

pistils 20 or more.

narrowly urn-shaped;

sepals uniformly violet-blue, oblong-lanceolate, 2-2.5(-3) cm, margins narrowly expanded distally to about 1 mm wide, thin, crispate, proximally tomentose, tips spreading to recurved, acute to acuminate, abaxially sparsely puberulent.
Achenes

nearly terete, not conspicuously rimmed, densely pubescent;

beak ca. 3.5 cm.

bodies appressed-puberulent;

beak 1.5-2.5 cm, appressed-puberulent.

Clematis vitalba

Clematis socialis
Phenology Flowering summer (Jun–Aug). Flowering spring–fall.
Habitat Roadsides, waste ground, secondary growth Openings in wet bottomland woods
Elevation 0-100 m (0-300 ft) 200 m (700 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
ME; OR; WA; BC; ON; native to Europe; n Africa [Introduced in North America]
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
from FNA
AL
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Clematis vitalba is naturalized in only a few sites in eastern North America and northwestern Oregon to the Puget Sound.

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

Of conservation concern.

Clematis socialis, the only species of Clematis subg. Viorna in the flora with horizontal, patch-forming rhizomes, is known only from three small populations in St. Clair and Cherokee counties south of Ashville, in northeastern Alabama.

(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. terniflora, C. texensis, C. versicolor, C. viorna, C. virginiana, C. viticaulis, C. viticella
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. tangutica, C. terniflora, C. texensis, C. versicolor, C. viorna, C. virginiana, C. vitalba, C. viticaulis, C. viticella
Name authority Linnaeus: Sp. Pl. 1: 544. (1753) Kral: Rhodora 84: 287. (1982)
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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