mr.shep, You profiles says that you are from San Joaquin Valley, California. I'm just around the corner in Modesto (I actually work in Stockton). I was wondering if you know of any good places to purchase maples in our area. The 'nice' nurseries have 5gal maples running over $200 and that's plain nuts!! Have you been to any nurseries in the Elk Grove area? I was thinking about heading to Grant Line Nursery but it's about a 45min drive... I'm not sure if you've been to Creative Water Gardens in Escolon but if you haven't it's the best place I've found in our area for maples... Thanks, Colby
Hi Colby: Right now I am on vacation from the UBC and am currently in Oregon. Have not been to Grant Line. Have been to Capital Nursery in Sacramento and Elk Grove. Matsuda's in Sacramento is highly recommended. Van's nursery in Modesto will have the cleanest Maples in your area if Abe still carries Maples but Van's is a wholesale nursery. If you will buy a quantity of five - 5 gallons he will sell to you. Bought a real nice 6' tall Sharp's Pygmy which came Iseli nursery at Morris nursery in Riverbank back in 1990. I usually only buy at wholesale or specialty nurseries when I can. I will buy larger sized Maples from Riverside nursery in Fresno. $200 for 5 gallon Maples is not nuts if the Maples have size and they are hard to find plants. Standard price for 5 gallons should be somewhere between $49-99 for the Maple. A quick note on OSH. For several years their Maples came from McCall's nursery in Fresno. I do not believe the Maples in OSH came from McCall's this year. The label on the plants is the same label on the Maples in COSTCO right now on their Bloodgoods and their Fireglows. The plants at COSTCO will get their red coloring once they are out in the sun. Even though the leaves are green indoors right now the leaves are right for Fireglow, at least the ones in Fresno were. Jim
My observation Last Monday I cut some small fireglow and bloodgood branches for my home decoration with other flowers. This morning I found that all fireglows leaves have turned green, but bloodgoods leaves stay in red. Mr. Shep, can I conclude that bloodgood keeps its color better than fireglow does indoor (or in shade)? Have a nice vacation in Oregon (and hopefully you could take a look at my seiryus pictures in another thread when you are back)
Hi PG: I am not on vacation, I am up here on business. I am on vacation from the UBC though, meaning that I did not want to post anything for a while and I wanted no private messages coming in from people that cannot write back a thank you when I've helped them in the past. If I know them that is one thing and most of them will know my personal E-Mail address but there have been some people writing at bad times for me and wanting information that I really did not want to give and so I did and was made to feel I was used again. That kind of stuff has been effectively stopped for a while. Thank you UBC, for having the options tab! I'll look at your green dissectum at another time but I know what your red dissectum is and knew it all along. I was hoping some people would browse over to the Esveld site as there are some pics of your Maple there. Here is a clue, I've already mentioned the name of it in the Seiryu thread. I was hoping there would be more interest and then I'd add in more information in how to tell that Maple apart from Vertrees' Oregon Garnet (the true form of Garnet came form Holland), Inaba shidare, Wada's Dissectum Nigrum and other closely related Atropurpureum forms. The coloring during the growing season and the size and shape of the leaves is what will distinguish your Maple from the other forms. People say they know your red dissectum but obviously that is a misnomer as no one really has ventured even a decent guess so far for that one. Does not surprise me at all as many people have not really ever seen your Maple or they have but it was called or labeled something other than what it is. You did good getting that Maple. In deep shade both Bloodgood and Fireglow will green out on us. Look at the shaded interior of the tree on a Bloodgood sometime and you will see the greenish colored, red tinged leaves. The Maples at COSTCO now, leafed out indoors or in a "dark" greenhouse and because of that there is only a hint of red of color at the present time on both Maples. The price is right for them but do not place them in real hot sun right now or they may very well burn up. Give them morning sun and late afternoon shade until they develop some color to them. Then move them out into full sun if need be. All things considered, both Maples will hold their red coloring about the same when they get ample sunlight. Grown in sun and then planted or placed in shade the colored up Bloodgood will hold its red color better than Fireglow will. Jim
mr.shep, Thanks for the info. I ended up getting the Red Dragon from the water garden store in Escolon. I couldn't walk away from it, the tree is gorgeous! I should have placed the pictures in this thread (I wasn't thinking). I created a new thread with the pictures if anyonewants to take a peek. I think I may go back tomorrow and pick up a nice sized Shindeshojo. They have one for $89 that stands about 6ft tall and full of glowing red leaves. It would look perfect on my patio.
A few weeks ago I was looking for some Maples myself and I visited Paisley Gardens in Merced who seem to be opening again under new management -- employee mentioned beginning of May. I was told that they have 10 gal pots (5-6 ft tall, 1/2 to 3/4 in caliper, trees) coming in, priced at around $150. They will also bring in some larger 24" pots & boxes for around $300 - $500. Are those good prices or are they too high? Thanks. TCR
Sorry for the delay to get back to you but I've been on vacation from the UBC for a while and may go back on an extended vacation at any given moment. Maple prices have gone up in the last couple of years. 15 gallon plants are going right around $179-250 for named cultivars but you have to watch out as many are not what the labels have on them. As case in point we just bought two 10 gallon Linearilobums that have Bloodgood tags on them. The leaves came out in the Spring just like old form Koto no ito with linear lobed leaves and were green and now the new growth is red, almost a bronzy purple red in lobes of 5's and 7's with much larger sized, vigorous leaves than the Spring leaves were. I know which form of linearilobum they are and we paid 79.95 for them for 7 foot tall plants from a mass merchandizer nursery. A little over 2 weeks ago I bought a Kobayashi form Tsuma beni, the same form pictured in the Vertrees 2nd edition book. Two years ago the Maple was $150 in a 15 gallon. Last year it was $250 in the same 15 gallon and this year it was $300 in a 20" box . I don't even want to talk about my error of my ways but the misses wanted that Maple to complement my Wada form Tsuma beni. Even green seedlings in a 20"-24" boxes are running $299 each. A real nice Iseli Bloodgood in a 36" box at a local nursery was purchased yesterday by a friend of ours for $839. Had the Red Dragon in a 36" box not had a sold tag on it our friend would have paid the $1,200 to have it, also an Iseli plant, instead. If I could still buy wholesale I would have bought the Red Dragon last year for me! What matters most is buying a cultivar from a nursery that stands behind their plant. If the nursery is selling a Maple they got in from Iseli nursery in Boring, Oregon, as a Sharp's Pygmy then it probably is. We cannot place enough emphasis on what having the right label for the right plant means to us as in some cases we will pay a higher price to have the Maple from a source we have grown though the years to trust. The name of the Maple is important but what is more important is the health of the plant the day we want to purchase it. The price for "clean" Maples has gone up but we are more likely to have these plants 15-30 years down the road as opposed to some of the 5 and 15 gallon plants that will not make it ten more years unless we plant them or take extreme measures to prune them, severely cut them back in some cases just to keep them alive. People will learn what I mean the hard way soon enough if they have not experienced this hardship yet. You can try looking in Merced for Maples but I think you are better off to look around Modesto and Riverbank as there are nurseries in both cities that I have done business with in the past. See the plant, ensure that it is in good health, looking for any dieback of top growth and then ask the nursery do they offer a return guarantee if you lose the Maple. If they will not stand behind their plant and offer a years guarantee, no questions asked just bring in the deceased plant for another one or a similar one if they do not have the same one, then do not buy from them. Sacramento has some nurseries that are well worth visiting and I've noticed an old friend is starting to sell some of the Maples they originally got from Don Kleim to even a few Home Depot's down here. I have my eye on two of them in five gallons at the present time. I'll know if I am right as to what they are as soon as they start to produce some new growth as I did not see their Spring coloring but the color on them now has me monitoring them. If you are not sure of what you are getting such as a Bloodgood that is a Bloodgood or a Burgundy Lace that is just a seedling then stick with the full service nurseries that will offer a money back guarantee or a plant replacement should you lose the plant. If you want plants for a landscape then 15 gallons are probably the most preferred size and with prices between $179-250 each, sometimes more. The plant had better be healthy or the nursery will have to pay the price for offering a less than healthy plant when they have to replace the plant or refund your money. Best solution for buying named forms is have an idea what the Maple is before you ever buy it. Buy a Vertrees 2nd edition book or the Vertrees/Gregory 3rd edition book and read the content. Get a "feel" for the cultivar before you buy it and then you will feel better once the cultivar is confirmed later. The hard thing to accept other than losing a Maple we did not want to lose is later learning the Maple is not what we bought it as being. It is tough on us to later learn our Bloogood we were so proud of may be just a seedling from a Bloodgood instead. I know of no one that takes learning that all in stride and frankly I know what it is like with some online purchases the last couple of years. Sometimes we have to throw the name on the label right out the window. We buy the plant because we like it and want to own it. It really does not matter what the proper name is if we are happy with our purchase is probably the best way to look at things. Even one of the more common green dissectums appeals to me and I just bought a rather large Kiri nishiki so with all this in mind the Viridis label on the plant did not mean a thing to me but it will have meaning to others. I am just happy to own my first Kiri nishiki and thanks goes to the Oregon grower that grew the plant. The mislabel may not have been the growers fault but that does not matter to me. They helped sell me a Maple that appealed to me when I saw it. I paid the money for it and I am pleased to have it and I'll buy from that nursery again next year like I did the year before when we bought two other nice green dissectums. We can overlook the name on the label if we get a relatively clean plant that will live for us and make us happy to have it for years to come. That is the bottom line for buying Japanese Maples. Jim
