Cheering ourselves up with Maples

Mr Maple just released video on Kamagata. I don't have this. I like.

 

@LoverOfMaples, the end to the perfect day D. Both lovely maples, looking forward to seeing them progress.
Think you will have some envious people on the thread, lol

 

Yes - Me lol

 

@Luke’s Maples, totally agree Luke. Can envy travel across the Atlantic!!!? Lol.
Just watched Kamagata as well. Perfect tree for sun it seems !!!

 

Kamagatas used to be so popular when i first started , you could buy them everywhere very rarely see them now , great for container growing you see far better colours , but slow growers get them in the ground for a few years first. Had this one for years now.

 

No it's another at the top of the garden , lets just say it's got a bit out of hand and needs attention.

 

No sorry don't have that one.

 

Ok thanks. Look forward to seeing some pics of the work you do on it.

I like your Kamagata. Another one for the never ending list lol.

 

It's a nice one to have. I've only had it 2 years.

@Luke’s Maples and @Acerholic I promise Ill be happy to provide the thread with pics at any time. Lol.

I'm envious of you guys for having such amazing color this year!

 

@LoverOfMaples, good morning D, at least we can share our photos and information here.
Looks like a bit of envy to and fro across the Atlantic lol.

 

@ROEBUK, good morning M, weather looks a lot better today. Lovely Kamagata you have there. I do like the clumps it forms. Was shown on Mr Maple like that, but I thought it was just that particular one. Now seeing yours I can see it's the cultivar form.
I agree it does look good in a container. Perfect for a patio in the sun.

 

Good morning, at last the sun is shining and the wind has eased.
These two in my garden moments ago are the brightest reds again this year during Summer. They out perform everything else in my collection in holding their wonderful s scarlet reds year after year.

They are 'Skeeters broom' and 'Atropurpureum'.

 

Wonderful D

 

D., I did look into either a 15kl or 30kl tank a few years ago. But it seemed like a tremendous amount of upset in the garden for the advantage. Plus our house is a 450 year old foundationless structure, with floors laid on dirt, not even sand. So we get a lot of warnings about bad things that might happen if we dig big holes near the house.

We do have a 1kl collector which I use for hand watering, and which is fed by a decent amount of roof and fills up quickly. It actually has some water in it from the showers we had about 3 weeks ago. The main thing is we have an "OK" well to pump from, when the water table is OK (as it is now, we had plenty of rain over the winter) so if necessary we can pull a couple of kl from there per day. We actually have a better well also, good enough that both the Nazis and the Americans camped in our fields in order to use it, but it's 20m downhill and at some distance, so the cost of putting it into service for the garden up here would be prohibitive.

The sad drawback of a large garden is that it's virtually impossible to water it in case of drought. I do what I can, and will be watering all WE probably, but it is very time consuming; so usually the theory is, once a maple makes it 2 years, it's on its own...

My wife posted a couple of house pictures on FB following the visit by the film team last Friday, we're looking quite tony without the usual dog toys and junk all over the place, so I thought I'd share them with you. You'll see what I'm talking about re digging anyway! :)

-E

 

@emery, good morning Emery, your house is something you see in magazines, 'absolutly wonderful'. Together with your garden and it's history of the Germans and Americans camping there in WW11, I can see why it was chosen to be filmed and written about. Do tell your wife from mine that she absolutely loves the house. Seeing and hearing all that about your property would entice a lot of people to move to the village. From abroad as well.
Having your own well is just amazing, I expect you have made a feature of it? But to have two, now that's just greedy, lol.
I fully agree about trees in the ground after two years have to fend for themselves, but pots, now that's a different ball game.
I can see the costs would be massive for the size of your land, to pump water from the lower well.
My hope is that people viewing this thread and there is a lot, will take heed and consider buying at least one water butt now or in the future. 'Rain water is best'

Enjoyed your response very much Emery

Have a good weekend to both of you.

 

This mornings walk in some sunshine, took these photos of a lovely Acer pseudoplatanus ' Atropurpurea'.

 

Thanks so much for the lovely complement, and the message has been transmitted. Old houses are a joy, but also a worry sometimes, not to mention a money pit.

Rain water is best indeed!

That's a lovely sycamore, it is one of my favorite maples. I have a lovely memory of hiking the cliff path on the Ile de Groix, with our young children, and scrambling down into a ravine where a stream came out into the sea. The ravine was lined with A. pseudoplatanus f. purpureum, which reached up into the bright sunlight and sparkled green and purple in the ocean breeze. I have a lovely young one that was collected by a Breton friend for is. near Nantes. It doesn't really have its feet well under it yet.

Is the one you've pictured known to be 'Atropurpureum'? Most of those cultivars are sold under the name 'Spaethii', though apparently the true Spaethii clone is lost to cultivation. But in truth 99% of trees sold under the label are simply seedlings with better or worse coloring and habit. It's quite frustrating, one of those sources of dishonesty (or ignorance) in the nursery business.

Well, back to watering. -E

P.S. here is a picture of 'Koto no ito' between 'Akikase nishiki' and 'Utsu semi', taken on the 2nd.

 

Well finally managed to get out this morning to do some thinning and shaping on a Seiryu which i have at the top of the garden for a few years now, was going to do this yesterday but rain stopped play. Starting pics with what it looked liked in the fall then that's when i decided that it needs to come up for this year , starting to get to big now and will probably be moved on in a couple of years time (get something new :) ) plus it was growing into two different cultivars on either side.Second picture in early January when i removed around two foot all around the top to try and give an even round crown , so come the summer time ie now i would be able to get a better visual appearance of the new leaf growth and shape, then i could see what needed to be cut out and trimmed to achieve a more aesthetic/neater look. The following pictures are what the tree now looks like ready for lifting after the fall into a large 180 litre container like shown.The red Heartbeat is going to replace this , have too many green cultivars in this corner and there is also a large Ki hachijo behind which will also be coming up as well to try and balance the colours out more. The last picture is of my other larger Seiryu which i basically did the same work on last year, mainly removing a section of the lower limbs and thinning out on top , Seiryus will take any amount of harsh pruning you care to give them and they just come back year after year as though you haven't touched them , really a good tree for working on with out fear of damaging it. I always like to call this cultivar the japanese knot weed of the maple world , just keeps on growing !! Easy trees to work on start at the bottom and work your way up , just under an hour to complete and all the waste gets collected on Monday, garden waste day.

 

The Acer I photographed is not known as Autopurporeum, but it is what I believed it to be. No labels at all.
Lovely Koto no ito btw.

 

@ROEBUK, what a brilliant posting M, a full diary of training, colours and seasonal differences.

 

Great job M.

 

You know social isolating is inflicting a toll
when I begin seeing dancing flames in a gathering of leaves.

 

@wind-borne, good evening G, someone is feeling rather poetic this evening !!
Dancing flames, perfect choice of words for a perfect maple.

 

What a beautiful home.

 

Hi all, new to the forum, some wonderful photos here! Here are my field maple and Japanese mountain maple! Thanks to @Acerholic for confirming that my mountain maple is starting to prepare its leaves for autumn!