Mexican Jasmine
Mandevilla foliosa
Family: Apocynaceae
Mostly evergreen, sprawling shrub to 3’ tall and wide. Yellow, pleasantly aromatic flowers appear summer into fall. The foliage is glossy green.
Grow in morning sun, afternoon shade, or full shade. Regular water with good drainage. Hardiness unknown, probably at least to 20°F. Rare to non-existent in cultivation.
Larval food plant for the Milkweed Tussock Moth (Euchaetes egle). Hummingbirds and other nectar feeders use flowers. Probably moth pollinated.
Photo by Stephen Hale, SEINET
Mandevilla foliosa on iNaturalist
There are 179 species of Mandevilla native to the Southwestern United States, Mexico, Central America, the West Indies, and South America. The genus name Mandevilla was awarded by John Lindley, a botanist, in memory of Henri Mandeville (1773-1861), one of his fellow British gardening enthusiasts who was a diplomat in Buenos Aires (Argentina). The species name, foliosa, means foliated or leafy.
Distributed throughout the Sierra Madre of Sonora, Chihuahua, Sinaloa, and Durango, and a few small populations in Arizona, on rocky slopes in desert grassland and into chaparral and pine-oak forest.