Japanese Anise. A tea is made from the foliage of this plant for Japanese religious ceremonies. As a landscape plant in part or filtered sun, it is unexcelled. Dark green glossy leaves are half the size of I. floridanum. The flowers have up to 30 petals, 1" in diameter on a 1" long pedicel and are a greenish cream-white. The geometrically shaped seed pods closely resemble those of the Chinese star anise, Illicium verum. However, the seedpods of Japanese Anise are poisonous! We have never seen any leaf spot or disease problems with this species. The Japanese have numerous variegated and colored leaf forms of this plant of which we will be introducing a number of these over the next few years.