What is the difference between hibiscus and peony flowers? A quick guide to telling them apart

Hibiscus is a plant in the Malvaceae family and Hibiscus genus, also known as hibiscus flower, frost-rejecting flower, and wood lotus, while peony is a plant in the Ranunculaceae family and Paeonia genus, a perennial deciduous shrub. The flower colors and flower shapes of the two are very similar, so where are the main differences between hibiscus flowers and peony flowers?

1. Different morphology

Hibiscus flower: The stem has stellate hairs or short pubescence. The leaves are large, broadly ovate and nearly round-ovate, palmately 5-7 lobed, with blunt serrations along the edges, and both sides have yellow-brown down. The flowers are large and beautiful, growing at the tips of branches, single or double, with a pedicel 5-8 cm long, bearing 8 small bracts, and a short, bell-shaped calyx. It blooms from October to November. In the early morning when the flowers open they are milky white or pink, and by evening they turn deep red.

Peony flower: The stem reaches up to 2 m tall; the branches are short and thick. The leaves are usually bipinnately trifoliolate, occasionally the leaves near the branch tips have 3 leaflets; the terminal leaflet is broadly ovate, green on the surface, hairless, pale green on the underside, sometimes with a white bloom, and the lateral leaflets are narrowly ovate or oblong-ovate. The petiole is 5-11 cm long and, like the leaf rachis, is hairless.

2. Different distribution areas

Hibiscus flower: It originated in China and is distributed in Sichuan, Yunnan, Shandong and other places, with the most cultivation and the longest history in the Chengdu area, which is why Chengdu is also known as “Rongcheng”. Hibiscus flowers prefer a warm and humid climate and sunny conditions, and have relatively strong adaptability.

Peony flower: Peony is one of China's top ten famous flowers, with thousands of years of natural growth and more than 1,500 years of artificial cultivation history. It is planted in every province of our country, among which Heze, Luoyang and Beijing have the largest and most concentrated cultivation areas.

3. Different effects

Hibiscus flower: The flowers, leaves, branches and roots of hibiscus can all be used as medicine, with effects such as clearing heat and cooling blood, reducing swelling and draining pus. It is suitable for conditions such as heat boils, sores and carbuncles, breast carbuncles, and lung-heat cough and lung abscess; it can also be used for abnormal uterine bleeding caused by blood heat, often in combination with lotus seedpod shells.

Peony flower: It contains astragalin. Besides being ornamental, it can also be used as medicine to regulate menstruation and invigorate blood. Peony bark has antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, anti-allergic, anti-tumor, hemostatic, blood stasis-removing, heat-clearing and detoxifying, sedative, analgesic, and antispasmodic activities, and can also promote the phagocytic function of monocytes and improve the body's specific immune function.

That is all for the differences between hibiscus flowers and peony flowers. Friends who want to grow and care for flower varieties can observe them specifically at the flower market before buying.