Lonicera japonica, Japanese Honeysuckle, jin yin hua, ren dong teng

Lonicera japonica, Japanese Honeysuckle, the dried flowers of which are known in Traditional Chinese Medicine as jin-yin-hua, and the stems with leaves attached as ren-dong-teng, have been used in Chinese herbal traditions for over 1000 years. Today widely used in prescriptions and patent medicines in China to treat colds and flu. Flowers contain at least a dozen antiviral compounds. Introduced to Western horticulture in 1806, a particularly vigorous selection entered the horticultural trade in 1862, and that selection has become a serious invasive weed in the Southeastern United States.

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