US Plant Patent PP13913
Torchy
Hibiscus plant named ‘Torchy’
PUBLIC DOMAIN
Patent expired September 27, 2021. This plant is in the public domain — anyone may propagate and sell it.
Twenty years from the filing date would end on September 10, 2021. This patent earned 17 days of term adjustment for delay at the Patent Office, which is why it runs longer.

The record
- Patent number
- PP13913
- Filed
- September 10, 2001
- Granted
- June 24, 2003
- Expires
- September 27, 2021
- Inventor
- FLEMING DAVID W; ZWETZIG GRETCHEN A
Abstract
A new and distinct cultivar of winter hardy Hibiscus plant named, ‘Torchy’ is the result of a unique hybridization. This new and distinct cultivar is characterized primarily as to novelty by its extreme cold hardiness to Zone 4, its bright green, deeply-lobed leaves, its large, campanulate, red flowers with ruffled petal edged, its vigorous and uniform growth habit, and its floriferous nature from midsummer until frost.
Show the legal claimThe single numbered claim as granted — the legal text that defines what this patent covers.
We claim: 1. A new and distinct cultivar of Hibiscus plant, as herein shown and described, characterized by its bright green, refined and deeply lobed foliage, its large, overlapping velvety red flowers with ruffling at the petal edges, its more compact size, its vigor, and its hardiness.
Read the full patent: US Plant Patent PP13913 in full — the complete specification, every figure, and the file history.