Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
General Subjects => General Forum => Topic started by: mark smyth on September 28, 2009, 01:59:38 PM
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Yes I know there are 1000s of acers but you never know someone might have these two.
I need a small acer for summer/autumn interest to plant in some troughs that have bulbs.
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Hi Mark, Lovely images. Which Celmisia is shown in Acer 2-1 please?
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Cliff thanks. Would you like a bit of the Celmisia? I can ask for you.
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My apologies Mark - I misread your post and assumed that these were your troughs! I would appreciate an identification if that would prove possible please?
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Of course. I'll make a phone call tonight
Mark
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Mark,
I'm not sure, but Acer 2 is possible 'Red Pygmy'.
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Possibly Celmisia incana? But it hybridises readily.
Mark, are you really wanting an Acer that will stay small enough for a trough? Would have to be a really BIG trough.
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Looks, if anything, to be a little TOO silvery (and too lax) for the Celmisia incana we are used to over here, Lesley?
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Incana is the whitest of all, I'm pretty sure. David Lyttle or Dave Toole would know, if they're looking here. It is a procumbent species with short upright stems making a wide mat.
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C. incana is correct
Lesley yes I was hoping to torture some Acers
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Many thanks Lesley and Mark for the identification and the confirmation ... it looks a potential show plant if grown hard. It certainly appears whiter than the clone that is currently being exhibited at the northern shows.
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whiter than the clone that is currently being exhibited at the northern shows.
Then probably not as white as this pic Cliff.
Cheers dave.
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What a stunning bit of Scree Garden, Dave!
cheers
fermi
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Thanks Fermi
Unfortunately not of my hand ---(the big fella upstairs can take all the credit) ;D
Cheers Dave.
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Thanks Fermi
Unfortunately not of my hand ---(the big fella upstairs can take all the credit) ;D
Cheers Dave.
Not Gordon Brown then, Dave? Fabulous form - is it in cultivation?
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Apologies Mark ... we seem to have hijacked your acer thread ... hope you get the information that you requested.
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No problem. All threads go astray.
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Mark, as you may remember, we have some small cement troughs which have had acers living in them for nearly thirty years. These are only now beginning to look badly done by!
I'd say get any young acer you like the look off and plant it........ then, as you say, "torture" it in the bonsai fashion as and when needed. What we did with ours was to plant 'em amd leave 'em! Bit of renewal of top surface every ten years or so, some feeding and, in most years, some watering in the summer. Really no work at all and we have been rewarded by a fabulous display over all these years.
I believe that it has been lack of attention to watering in the last couple of years which has lead to their present decline :-[ :-X
I'll measure the containers later and post the sizes and look for pix of the plants to show .
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Fabulous form - is it in cultivation?
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Probably being grown up country by some of the Canterbury people Cliff.
If i remember correctly Celmisia incana was listed in the NZAGS seedx a year or two back.
I haven't collected seed as it's at the other end of the South Island.
Cheers dave.
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Fabulous form - is it in cultivation?
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I haven't collected seed as it's at the other end of the South Island.
Cheers dave.
But that won't stop you this coming summer Dave. On yer bike lad. :D
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The garden owner, Margaret Glynn, told me last night the Celmisia came from Susan Tindall. I just phoned her to see if she has any but sadly she doesnt. She suggests Ian Christie.
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Many thanks for taking the time and trouble to enquire, Mark ... hopefully I will see Ian at the SRGC Conference this weekend.
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Mark, as you may remember, we have some small cement troughs which have had acers living in them for nearly thirty years. These are only now beginning to look badly done by!
I'd say get any young acer you like the look off and plant it........ then, as you say, "torture" it in the bonsai fashion as and when needed. What we did with ours was to plant 'em amd leave 'em! Bit of renewal of top surface every ten years or so, some feeding and, in most years, some watering in the summer. Really no work at all and we have been rewarded by a fabulous display over all these years.
I believe that it has been lack of attention to watering in the last couple of years which has lead to their present decline :-[ :-X
I'll measure the containers later and post the sizes and look for pix of the plants to show .
Having trouble finding pix of the acers in containers.... here is a scanned slide, from the mid to late 1980s ..... that bit of garden looks very young then! You can see the acers around the pond, which is between the sculpture on the middle left and the pergola.
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And here is an acer in apot.... this time one which was growing as a tree in the garden and which has been adapted to be a bonsai type... here is what Ian wrote about it in a bulblog...
Acer in pot
It is not just bulbs that I grow in pots - I have had this Acer growing in a pot for over ten years now. I raised it from seed and it started out in the garden but as always I was too ambitious with the number of trees that I planted so when it reached three meters high I decided that it had to go or be moved - not having any space to move it too I decided to try and cut it down to grow in a pot. I first cut around the roots about 30 cms from the trunk and then I also cut the trunk down to about 30cms in height. It was around this time of year that I lifted the root ball and trimmed all the roots back so they would fit into the pot. The plant had all winter to start making some new roots and in the spring I watched the sawn off trunk with anticipation for any signs of growth buds developing - which they did in abundance. I reduced the number of new growths and only kept the ones I needed to create a tree shape in small scale and every year I reduce the new growth to one growth bud. It is only a Bonsai in t
hat sense of the word that it is a tree growing in a pot. In a way I treated the dug-up-trunk and cut-back roots like a bulb.
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Great idea for small space and all the benefits of change of season colour I was wondering if it would work with Sorbus cashmiriana as a bonsai?
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Very nice and a sure winner at a bonsai competition
I saw plant labelled as Red Pygmy at a garden centre yesterday but it didnt look like the plant in the photos at the start. I did see what I thought was Red Pygmy but it had another name. Maybe these plants are as mixed up as bulbs.
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RR I would also consider torturing a Sorbus in a pot.
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As well as a number of more "genuine" bonsai that Ian grows, I also have kept a copper beech in a pot for about 20 years.... it's lovely ..... less than four feet high, including its container!
Given some extra feeding on occasion and attention to watering, I see no reason not to attempt any manner of woody subjects in pot or troughs. A chum has a lovely oak tree in a container on a terrace - I'll try to get photo before the leaves drop!
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... And I have kept a very large Salix reticulata in a pot for many a moon (it's dead mind you)!! :D
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... And I have kept a very large Salix reticulata in a pot for many a moon (it's dead mind you)!! :D
That's cheating, Cliff, and does not count! ;D ::)
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Amazing how forgiving these plants are, no? I grow Acers as well as gingkos, conifers (bananas and oleander) and other trees in pots, mostly for the portability of it. These plants for the most part do fine with relatively little maintenance, and are focal points that will be scattered throughout the new garden once it is protected from deer (who would prune a little more heavily than I). My favorite of the moment is Chamaecyparis obtusa 'Chairman', which is growing in a Betsy Knapp pot and situated as a centerpiece on an outdoor table.
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I have a small selection of small conifers in pots, Prunus Kojo no mai, Prunus japnonica and Taxus standishii
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My favorite of the moment is Chamaecyparis obtusa 'Chairman', which is growing in a Betsy Knapp pot and situated as a centerpiece on an outdoor table.
Carlo,
sorry but what is a Betsy Knapp pot ??? ???
Never heard before.
Is 'Chairman' a witches broom? Can't find a good picture of this cultivar.
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Sorry Uli. Betsy is a trough maker from Rochester NY and was chosen by me to make the troughs for The New York Botanical Garden rock garden when I was curator there. We've stayed in touch over the years and I have several containers made by her--in her distinctive finish and design.
C. obtusa 'Chairman' is described by Goscote Nurseries (UK) as "A charming little conifer which is ideal to grow in a rockery or trough. Tiny, dense green foliage on a miniature upright plant. Requires a fertile, moist, but well drained soil in sun or part shade. Height 18 inches in 10 years." This is a reasonably good description. The photographs I've seen on line are a mixed bag, although a reasonably good one is included in an offering on eBay.
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Which reminds me, Maggi, that you inquired about an acer I had shown, photographed in Fota Island, some time back. I had collected some seed which germinated and now have a number of small, very small, plants with the leave just beginning to drop. Will I drop one in the post - or will I hold it until you visit next September?
I can't for the life of me think of its name - it is on the label outside but I am having coffee and muffins (not just lazy).
Paddy
Post Scriptum: It was Acer grosseri, posted on November 3rd, 2008
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Hang fire with the Acer, please, Paddy. Ashley send me some seeds and I'm hopeful of a wee forest!
All this talk of muffins is making me hungry ............. :-\
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The innumerable seedlings of Acer palmatum in variety, which appear in gardens with that species, make great little pot (or trough) plants with super autumn colour and they keep small with judicious trimming and due to the root confinement.
Yesterday on my travels I called into the carpark where I'd collected my berries from Sorbus cashmeriana, intending to photograph the spring shrub coming into flower but found it had gone, chopped out to make 2 more car park spaces.
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Can you do a picture of the Betsy Knapp pot with 'Chairman' please Carlo?
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As well as a number of more "genuine" bonsai that Ian grows, I also have kept a copper beech in a pot for about 20 years.... it's lovely ..... less than four feet high, including its container!
Given some extra feeding on occasion and attention to watering, I see no reason not to attempt any manner of woody subjects in pot or troughs. A chum has a lovely oak tree in a container on a terrace - I'll try to get photo before the leaves drop!
Right, after a long wait... here is a photo of my Friend's oak tree, grown in a half barrell.... it's been in there for 34 years
Also, An Acer she grows in a pot, it's at least 20 years old.
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Well, I think they make a great display of colour and something very different as a focal point on the patio - wonderful to think they are quite and age and look very youthful 8)
How old are the two small ones I wonder - one looks like a maple?
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The Oak and Acer give me ideas
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How old are the two small ones I wonder - one looks like a maple?
The wee oak is about ten to twelve and the others about six years
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Me too Mark. :)
Oddly, today Carlo sent me a picture of the 'Chairman' conifer in the BK pot. They're both beautiful.
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Didn't want you to think I'd forgotten about you Leslie...I snapped away with my phone and presto...right to email.
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Didn't want you to think I'd forgotten about you Leslie...I snapped away with my phone and presto...right to email.
Would you post it here too Carlo? or may I?
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Feel free to post it Leslie...I won't have the time today to search the archives for the way to do it...Thanks!
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Hopefully (if I've saved it properly) here is Carlo's pic of the little conifer 'Chairman' in its beautiful pot. See Reply 30 on previous page.)
[attachthumb=1]
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Wow...thanks Leslie...iPhone to the rescue (though I really need to figure out how to size and post...I'll hit the archives one day...).
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I just right clicked on your pic and clicked on "Save Picture" which then happened as a jpg in "My Pictures" from which I uploaded to the thread. Easy. :)