Very cool!!!! What does it look like the rest of the year? Might have to add it to my collection... :)
I have only had this cultivar a few years and the spring white color turns to white with green veins and then to green. I planted a second larger plant in more shade this past year and I am told this will help the white spring color last longer. Ed
I don't think Ed follows the forum very closely, and also think he won't mind if I show a couple more recent pictures of his plant. I have these from the MS web site design, where Ed kindly provided some eye candy, so I guess he gave me permission to share. Besides, my 'Wakoh nishiki' finally died, it appears, and I was just thinking about asking Ed for a graft of his HS. The most recent of these pictures is only from 2014, I believe the thing is now enormous. I think Alex's plant is large now too, can you show us a pic @alex66 ?
pics date spring 2018 /2021 (just sprout)now is around 5 meters high for 2.50 large-source Guy Mallot (2018 pics) source Esveld (2021) pics-by Maillot it have a fastigiate habitat with out prune-
It's surprising to see that some cultivars that are supposed to be "clones" can sometimes have slightly different characteristics : I suppose the rootstock plays a part since the scions are supposed to be genetically all the same. I wonder if scions taken from trees grown on different rootstocks can keep some characteristics of the rootstock... ???
It is possible for the transfer of genetic material to take place between the understock and scion. I used to have a good paper talking about this in the particular context of JMs. specifically when red cultivars are grafted on green rootstocks. Unfortunately I can't find it, but I did a quick search and came up with a few papers, e.g.: Exchange of genetic material between cells in plant tissue grafts - PubMed or The give-and-take of DNA: horizontal gene transfer in plants - ScienceDirect What I recall from the earlier paper is that genetic drift (horizontal gene transfer?) takes place mostly in the close vicinity of the graft itself, so it wouldn't be likely to effect future scion wood. What we really need is standardized root stock, so that large-growing cultivars would go on vigorous stock, dwarfs on dwarfing stock, etc. This could be achieved by cloning root stock with tissue culture, but because variable seed grown stock is so cheap and easy, no one has ever seen fit to do it. Some stock is produced in the Netherlands by peg layering, which should produce some consistency, but ends up producing really gawd-awful understock.
Thanks Emery. That confirms that if I had had more scientific background, my intuition would have made me a genius. Huh huh... But I still have a lot to learn and I'm afraid I'm running short of time now : I had never heard the term "peg layering"before. It's a bit like ground-layering, right ?
Have been doing this for many years over hear E, It works so well and you have a clone that is very strong from my experience doing this. Important to remove the outer bark so the cambium comes into contact with the soil and also pegged down firmly. It is a longer process than air layering, (around 18 months), but as I said, it does produce strong new trees.
Yeah, "peg layering" is exactly ground layering, more of a method description I suppose. Not sure where I first heard the term. Derek, are you saying understock has been produced commercially this way in the UK, or you've done it personally? I haven't heard of it being done there, because seed generated understock is so cheap. Of course the problem is the classic one: how well do rooted JM cuttings do in the long term? Many pros preach that they are prone to sudden failure 5-10 years in, Pat at Hippo is prone to say that most of the van Son & Koot big-box-5-buck-cuttings will die before too long, but at the price, who cares? :) Aside from this problem, the stock I've seen has clearly been pulled quite quickly, certainly not after 18 months. As a result, the roots are often weak and only along one side, with no proper flare at all. These weak stock plants seem then to be used rapidly -- none of the "leave it in a pot for a year before use" that the good grafters recommend -- and are really likely to fail. Most seed grown understock is ready to graft onto 2 years after germination.
