Tag Archives: driveway trees

Garden Lore: May 23, 2014

“Momordica – Cucurbitaceae – The Squirting Cucumber. An annual gourd-like plant, with woolly leaves, and yellow flowers, the fruit of which resemble a small cucumber; and which, when ripe, bursts the moment it is touched, scattering its seeds, and the half liquid, pulpy matter in which they are contained, a considerable distance. This quality made it a favourite, in gardens, a century ago, when some people were yet in a state of sufficient barbarism to find amusements in the annoyance of others; but it has now deservedly fallen into disrepute, and is seldom grown.”

Jane Webb Loudon “The Ladies’ Companion to the Flower Garden” (1840)

Vegetable time bombs, we call them

Vegetable time bombs, we call them

Garden Lore: Magnolia Little Gem

I stopped to photograph this driveway in town because it is like a vegetable time bomb waiting to give its owners no end of problems. What you are looking at is a narrow driveway flanked on either side by avenues of Magnolia Little Gem. At this stage, it still looks quite attractive. Little Gem is a good looking plant with glossy, dark green leaves and brown felted indumentum beneath. In summer, it will sporadically produce attractive white flowers. The mistake often made is in thinking that the descriptor “little” in its name, means it will stay small. While it will not get as large as some of the other grandiflora magnolias, it is still going to be an 8 metre tree and have a spreading canopy. You can already see it spreading.

In narrow spaces, you need narrow, columnar trees (technically ‘fastigiate’) which can give height and structure, without width. If you are going to choose a plant which forms a canopy, you need to keep the branching above the height of vans and small trucks – probably 3 metres up. Clip and shape from the very start so that you don’t have to undertake radical work when the trees become a problem.

It takes a lot more effort and expense to remove established trees which have outgrown their allotted space than it takes to plant them in the first place. It is better to get the selection right at the start.

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.

Flowering this week – Prunus Pearly Shadows

The flowers on Pearly Shadows are at least two weeks early this season

The flowers on Pearly Shadows are at least two weeks early this season

The disconcerting aspect about the pale pink froth of Prunus Pearly Shadows this week is that it normally happens around Labour Weekend which is still two weeks away. The flowering is early all round the garden this spring. So the drifting pink petals like snow flakes on a breeze may all be over by the time our garden festival starts at the end of the month. At least the new growth is an attractive and distinctive bronze though hardly as pretty as the flowers.

Pearly Shadows is a Japanese cherry with very full, fluffy double flowers. While Felix Jury named it, he did not breed it. The tree is too good just to be a chance seedling so it is a fair bet that it may have a proper Japanese name in Japan but nobody has ever been able to tell us what it is.

Pearly Shadows has a very useful shape as a tree, being like a capital Y which gets the upper branches out of the way. Some other Japanese cherries tend to grow more in the shape of capital T with low, spreading branches. A Y shape makes a better tree to line a driveway than a T shape.

Japanese cherries are pretty as a picture and make a quick growing impact tree but they are rarely long-lived in local Taranaki conditions. We are too damp and they can develop root problems and up and die unexpectedly. They also have a tendency to develop witches broom which can be seen as very dense foliar growth with no flowers. The witches broom will take over the tree if you don’t stay on top of it and cut it out in summer. By that stage, the entire tree is in full leaf and unless you have marked the offending sections, you will probably have forgotten which bits to take out.

A useful Y shape for a driveway tree

A useful Y shape for a driveway tree