American Wisteria (Wisteria frutescens)

Plantae>Magnoliophyta>Magnoliopsida>Fabales>Fabaceae>Wisteria frutescens (L.) Poir.

American Wisteria is an uncommon high-climbing deciduous vine of bottomland forests in the Coastal Plain of North Carolina.

Cape Fear River, Pender Co., NC 4/19/09.

The unscented flowers emerge after the leaves.

Cape Fear River, Pender Co., NC 4/19/09.

Flowers just beginning to open.

Cape Fear River, Pender Co., NC 4/19/09.

	Pender Co., NC 4/23/06.
	The flowers are unscented. Much less common than the similar Chinese Wisteria (Wisteria sinensis), which has grape-scented flowers that bloom before the leaves emerge and has velvety seed pods, unlike the smooth ones of American Wisteria. Pender Co., NC 4/23/06.
	Rare in the Piedmont, where it is more commonly seen as an ornamental. It does well in cultivation, much more refined and controllable and less gaudy than the Chinese Wisteria. Planted specimen, Chapel Hill, NC.
	This is the cultivar 'Amethyst Falls'. Same plant.