Sweet Osmanthus (Osmanthus fragrans aurantiacus)
Description
Osmanthus fragrans variously known as sweet osmanthus, sweet olive, tea olive, and fragrant olive, is a species native to Asia from the Himalayas through southern China (Guizhou, Sichuan, Yunnan) to Taiwan and southern Japan and southeast Asia as far south as Cambodia and Thailand. It is the "city flower" of the cities of Hangzhou, Suzhou, Guilin in China and is the "town tree" of the town of Yoshitomi, Fukuoka Prefecture in Japan. It is an evergreen shrub or small tree growing to 3-12 m tall. The leaves are 7-15 cm long and 2.6-5 cm broad, with an entire or finely toothed margin. The flowers are white, pale yellow, yellow, or orange-yellow, small (1 cm long), with a four-lobed corolla 5 mm diameter, and have a strong fragrance; they are produced in small clusters in the late summer and autumn. The fruit is a purple-black drupe 10-15 mm long containing a single hard-shelled seed; it is mature in the spring about six months after flowering.
Taxonomic tree
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Domain: Eukarya
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Kingdom: Plantae
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Phylum: Magnoliophyta
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Class: Magnoliopsida
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Order: Lamiales
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Family: Oleaceae
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Genus: Osmanthus
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