CSIR-NEERI Biodiversity Portal

Firebush

Hamelia patens

Botanical name	: Hamelia patens Jacq.
Common Name	: Firebush
Family	: Rubiaceae
Synonym	: Hamelia erecta Jacq.
About	: Firebush is a showy, fast-growing, semi-woody evergreen shrub that can grow up to 4.6 m tall under ideal conditions, but usually stays much smaller. It has whorled leaves, usually with three but occasionally as many as seven at each node. The leaves are elliptic to oval, about 6 in (15 cm) long, and gray-pubescent underneath with reddish veins and petioles. Throughout the year, firebush produces terminal clusters (cymes) of bright reddish-orange or scarlet tubular flowers, each about 0.75 in (1.9 cm), and long. Even the flower stems are red. The clusters of fruit also are showy. Each fruit is a juicy berry with many small seeds, ripening from green to yellow to red and finally to black. It is native of Florida, West Indies, South and Central America. It is a hummingbird-pollinated plant. Firebush is used in herbal medicine to treat athlete's foot, skin lesions and rash, insect bites, nervous shock, inflammation, rheumatism, headache, asthma, and dysentery.