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| Won't be long til it looks like this |
At last, my ginkgo biloba is beginning to put its foot to the pedal. I bought it years ago, along with several others that arrived wrapped in plastic and looking skinny. I wondered if I'd been sent some rejects and the first few years proved that they were not very robust at all. Only two survived to this date and of those, one is growing at a snail's pace but the second is reaching for the sky! This season it's put on growth equivalent to the length of my forearm, elbow to fingertip. It might not seem much but it's significant and exciting to me. The reason for its vigour is seaweed soup and I've been feeding it buckets-full. I've opened the canopy around it too, to let in more light and it's making for it in a very satisfactory way. I will sit beneath it one day and gaze up into it's filligree of butter yellow leaves (it'll be autumn) and feel complete. This has been a long wait and I will savour the pleasure. I like ginkgo and thought it worth the trouble of trying to raise some in a climate that doesn't usually support them. The second and smaller tree is growing among natives alongside of the creek and may always be little, but I'm giving it a tonic as well and have cleared the branches that have been claiming it's light, so I may see action there next year.
5 comments:
And the weird thing is these broad leaved trees are conifers!!
True!
I've a needle tattooed on my arm!
One of my favourite deciduous trees is Liquidambar. I have one that I selected out of some seedlings that has a very 'Ginkgo' butter yellow autumn colour.
I don't know if you are familiar with Liquidambar trees but it is quite odd to have a clear yellow one as they are usually deep reds and almost purples.
I am going to try and graft it because they grow and colour much better than most deciduous trees here on the Coast.
I do know the Liquidamber, Shunda.
They aren't an especially popular tree down here as we don't get the autumnul effect, rather the leaves get blown off around that time. I knew them well from Nelson however.
Your yellow sounds promising. Will you graft onto ordinary Liquidamber rootstock? I'm guessing that'll be the way. It'll be interesting to learn how long it holds its habit and whether it'll start to throw-back after a few years, but good luck anyway. We have an older gentleman from Britain coming to teach hedgerow planting at our Harvest Festival (March 24/25) just out of interest.
I would be really keen to hear what he has to say, if finances were in better health I would seriously consider coming down.
I have been getting a bit of advice from a nursery in Invercargill re. deciduous trees, it turns out that conditions in Southland are a pretty good match for the West Coast and what works well down there seems to work well here.
I would like to explore Southlands trees in more detail.
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