Living in London means that even though spring has blossomed forth, there is still a chance of frost all the way through to the end of May. And many of us will have learned the hard way that frost and/or sub-zero temperatures can seriously damage our trees. One of the key risks of frost and […] Read more… >
Spring has sprung (finally) in the UK and now is the time that many trees flower, so they can pollinate the next generation with enough time for seeds to develop before winter. Plant reproduction is quite a complicated multi-stage process, but for the purposes of this post it’s enough to know that pollen is the […] Read more… >
Below is a shopping list if you’re wanting to create a bonsai pinetum. You may want to explore alternative species to include, if so the Gymnosperm database is a fantastic resource. ARAUCARIACEAE Monkey puzzle tree (Araucaria araucana) and/or Wollemi pine (Wollemia nobilis and/or Kauri (Agathis australis) CUPRESSACEAE Basic (5 genera): Hinoki cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa), Dawn […] Read more… >
A pinetum is an arboretum, or collection of trees, dedicated to conifers. There is a fabulous pinetum at RHS Wisley in the UK (my ‘About Me’ pic was taken there), and the UK National Pinetum at Bedgebury Forest has a collection of 12,000 specimen trees. Whilst very few of us have the space to create […] Read more… >
A pathogen is a microorganism such as a virus, bacterium, oomycete (water mould) or fungus which causes disease and/or death.ref Examples you might have heard of include Dutch Elm disease (caused by the fungus Ophiostoma ulmi), Horse Chestnut bleeding canker disease (caused by the bacterium Pseudomonas syringae v. aesculi), Ash dieback (caused by the fungus […] Read more… >
Flat leaves are found across the conifer families including Taxus, Cephalotaxus, and even in Pinus (check out Pinus krempfii) as well as many of the Araucariaceae and Podocarpaceae families. Commonly known trees with this leaf shape include all varieties of yew, swamp cypress, dawn redwood and coast redwood. Here are some examples: Conifer flat leaves […] Read more… >
I’ll be honest, I find conifer needles to be quite weird. As someone raised in the southern hemisphere, true pine trees were something we had at Christmas and that was about it (this is true because the most common Christmas tree found in Australia is Pinus radiata). But actually, needles really are just plain old […] Read more… >
Scale leaves are a curious form of conifer leaves which cover up the stem in interlocking patterns. I believe they are called ‘scale’ because they look a bit like fish scales in the way they overlap but I have not found an authoritative source which confirms this. Scale leaves appear primarily in the Cupressaceae family […] Read more… >
You may have noticed that certain conifer species’ leaves go a different colour over the winter without dying. This phenomenon is most associated with Buxus (box) and Cryptomeria japonica (Japanese cedar) which take on a range of bronze, reddy-brown colours, as shown in the examples below: Although it may look a bit alarming, these leaves […] Read more… >
I’ve been planning a post on this subject for a while because conifers have always been a bit scary to me from a bonsai point of view – they don’t seem as forgiving or obvious in terms of their growth behaviour. This was one of those subjects which ended up being a lot more interesting […] Read more… >