Abutilon vitifolium?

Today I was in Tavira, a town near the coast here in the Algarve in Southern
Portugal, where I was stopped in my tracks by a magnificent plant that was
growing in a traffic island bed. It had a single trunk, branching at about
one meter and was three meters high and wide. The tips of the branches were
covered with fully double flowers that were about 4 inches wide. What really
got my attention was that the flowers opened almost white with just a hint
of pink and gradually aged to pink then to red, all open at the same time,
this gave it a stunning effect. The flower could easily be mistaken for a
double rose! The broad palmate leaves are 6 inches long. The only plant that
I can think of that fits this description is Abutilon vitifolium (although
L.H. Bailey's Hortus Third calls it Corynabutilon vitifolium), but there is
no mention of double flowers or of having red and white flowers at once.

The RHS Plant Finder (95/96) lists album, Ice Blue, Tennant's White and
Veronica Tennant. None of these from the description in catalogues seems to
be my plant. Does anyone in the Medit-Plants group have any information on
the plant or have I stumbled on a new local variety?


Sunset Western Zones 19,21,22.
----  Graham Payne  ----  dpsgkp@mail.telepac.pt  ----
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