There are, I have heard, about 200 species of Hibiscus, and mine are
not the exotic and gorgeous "tropical" variety. Barbara and some other
folks in frost-free areas probably have those.

This variety is quite hardy in my vicinity, however, which is
officially rated to -10F (-23C) and where we regularly hit 0F (-18C).
I dare say that these would do well anywhere in England. They are
sometimes called swamp rose-mallow here and they are known as wetland
plants.

Although they are big and showy in August, they have limited color
selections. Most have the red center eye, but otherwise the petals are
just red to pink to white. It is the tropicals that have the rainbow
colors and wonderful markings, but most of those cannot take a frost.
And then of course there are the Rose-Of-Sharon woody shrubs (Hibiscus
syriacus), but those are a different story too.

JD



John, do you mean hardy in that they can take couple of degrees of frost?
I saw some at Kew Gardens a few years ago and was knocked out by the colour
and size of the flowers but didn't think they would be hardy enough over
here to survive our cold wet winters. (Summers are the same these days!!)
Some plants can take cold but not the almost daily change in temp coupled
with the wet.