In message .com,
Gardening_Convert writes
Can someone explain what Ericaceous means. I know it to do with Acid
loving plants but I was just wondering what the term is where does it
come from etc ?

Botanically, ericaceous means belonging to or pertaining to the plant
family Ericaceae, which includes heaths, rhododendrons, blueberries,
strawberry trees and so on. (Ericaceae is one of the families that was
much extended in the recent APG classification, so what it refers to
depends on what you're reading.)

These plants are mostly acid-loving plants, so ericaceous compost is an
acidic compost suitable for growing these (and other acid-loving plants,
such as Camellias).

I wouldn't be surprised to find ericaceous used informally for
acid-loving (in the context of flowering plant botany or horticulture) -
an ericaceous fungus (if anyone should write of such) would be one
associated with plants of the family Ericaceae, not an acid-loving
fungus, and a bacterium living in acidic geothermal pools would not be
ericaceous.
--
Stewart Robert Hinsley
http://www.malvaceae.info