What does everyone here think of this maple? It has been a very good dissectum for me and has such a unique appearance when compared to the other green dissectums. This picture just shows it in a white phase but it changes throughout the entire growing season with pinks, reds and white mixed in. Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' Beautiful tree! I planted a one gallon tree this year, hopefully mine will be as pretty as yours. Mike
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' I have found that in our hot and humid climate here in St. Louis this tree needs alot of shade to avoid leaf scorch. When I put it in the shade the base color stays mostly green with alot of pink, red and white and different times during the growing season. In this case the variagation is all white. Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' Customarily this is a reddish or purplish cultivar, the plant in your picture has the pure, spring green coloring of a non-red selection.
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' This tree when I received it was the customary color of 'Toyama Nishiki'. I grew it in a container the entire first first year. It retained the customary colors of 'Toyama Nishiki'. It had more leaf scorch than I was willing to live with so I moved it to a shady spot in the garden and since than it has shown the characteristics I have mentioned twice above now. The experience that I have had is pretty customary with maples based on the conditions they are grown in. Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' Ron, I have two 1gal. 'Toyama Nishiki' from another nursery that do pretty much the same thing for me here. I have 2 'Ukigumo' from 2 different nurseries that have never produced any of the customary colors of that cultivar. 'Tsuma gaki' is a beautiful tree for me here but it is never as intense as it is in some pictures I see. I have about 100 Japanese Maples at this time and most of them grow true to what one would expect out of them, true to the cultivar. 'Toyama Nishiki' has been a guessing game as to what I'm going to get. It has actually made this a fun tree to have. I will try to get a picture of it next year when it is in a different state of growth than the picture I posted above. Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' Kent, sometimes it does not matter where the tree is grown and if we see or not the color changes that are correct for the name of the Maple in question. Clearly the shapes and sizes of the leaf lobes and the shade of green color of your Maple is not right for Toyama nishiki. Certainly not correct for the original form that came in from Japan. So, if your Maple is not a Toyama nishiki, then which one of the these variegated green dissectums below is it? Ao shidare variegated Dissectum variegatum Goshiki shidare Technically, the true forms of Ornatum variegated, Beni shidare tricolor and Beni shidare variegated are variegated red dissectums. A quick note: The variegated green dissectums can still show pink coloration in the Spring, sometimes more pink in color than green. We can also see pink color in the second flush of new growth and again in the mid to late Summer new growth. All three of the green dissectums listed above can do this but only one will hold its pink coloring in the leaves longer than 2 weeks to a month depending on where the Maple is growing. As an example for us here, the pink on two of the Maples will only last about 2 weeks whereas the other if given ample morning sun with some afternoon shade can hold the pink for about a month and then the pink will fade and become a bronze shaded green. Two of the Maples above can have their pink color become the bronze shaded green later, one of them will not as it will go from a pink and fade out to the base color of green throughout the rest of the Maple, notwithstanding the white coloring also in the variegation of the leaf.. It makes no never you mind to me what nursery sold you this Maple and perhaps another Maple as being Toyama nishiki. I can say your Maple is a beautiful plant, one of the nicer examples I've seen, of another variegated green dissectum instead. Jim
Re: Acer palmatum dissectum 'Toyama nishiki' If we were to look online at various photos of Toyama nishiki we will see a variety of Maples called Toyama nishiki and it could very well be that none of them are the true form that came in from Japan. The variegated dissectums came about as a variant of a non-variegated dissectum. Thus Beni shidare variegated and tricolor were variants from the old Beni shidare Maple, which is a red leafed dissectum. The same correlation is true for Ornatum variegated which is the variegated form of Ornatum. For Toyama nishiki we have a problem from the outset in that Toyama nishiki is the variegated form of Toyama which is a red dissectum that few people have ever seen. Mr. Vertrees lists Sotoyama nishiki as a synonym of Toyama nishiki and it is here where the real problem that we had in the nursery lies. We felt the Sotoyama name should be Saotoyama instead indicating a green dissectum. Most of the Toyama nishiki we see available from nurseries are a two-toned green (dark green and lighter green) in the color with heavy white variegation. For the variegates the Toyama nishiki that we more commonly see will have the most white in the leaf than all of the other forms of variegated dissectums will have, even the variegated red form of Toyama will have more white in the leaf than an Ornatum variegated and the variegated Beni shidares will have. So in effect one reason for the disparity of the photos that we will see online of Toyama nishiki is due to the fact that we are dealing with two forms of not the same Maple. One a variegated green dissectum and the other a variegated red dissectum. The true form Ornatum variegated is seldom seen propagated any more and the true form Beni shidare variegated with up to 7 and 8 colors in the leaves (one to two shades of pink, one to two shades of red, white, gold, cream, light green, dark green) is almost extinct today, generally only seen in very select collections and never was propagated much in the US. It was a few people’s feeling this Maple never was introduced to Europe but Beni shidare tricolor had been sent to Europe instead and is probably still being propagated today. The Maple we more commonly see but this is not generally pointed out as so few people know the origin of this plant well is that what we mostly see available for a variegated green dissectum that has lots of pink in the Spring and again in the mid to late Summer growth is the Dissectum variegatum. There are two forms of the Dissectum variegatum of which one of the forms has been sold as Goshiki shidare for years in the US. This is true for both forms, in cooler climates the pink coloring on a green base colored leaf will hold much longer than the pink will hold here for us. Even in Eugene, Oregon, the pink can last up to 6 weeks (sometimes up to 5 weeks in Roseburg to the South of Eugene) but for us the pink will fade out and later turn a bronze shaded green (bronze overtone on a green leaf) in about two weeks, depending on how much sun the plant gets. If we grew these forms in high shade the pink will last longer but we saw much less white in the variegation as a result, which is why our true form of Goshiki shidare had to be given ample morning sun otherwise we did not see much white in the variegation, the same was also true for the one form of Dissectum variegatum which is actually a tricolor form of Dissectum variegatum. Confused yet? Let me add to the intrigue. There was a sport off the Saotoyama variegated form that has lobes even more stringy in their shape than the new growth usually has. This stringy sport was propagated in Oregon and was outlet to a few collections. What became an issue is that the stringy sport would hold its form much better in warmer climates grown in sun and in the cooler areas of Oregon the strings later became strap-like as the leaves grew older during the year as the Maple got older in age, regardless of being planted in the ground or grown in containers. There are some examples of the stringy around but they are rather limited. Even the reverted forms in Oregon have been propagated and sold, so someone I know that had 4 to 5 different forms of Toyama nishiki come in from different sources in Oregon and from one source in Washington in recent years that tells me those Maples all appear to be different in either color and/or leaf shape does not surprise me one bit. We will have to wait until these Maples get some age on them to better know what he has but for now, it could very well be that all of those Maples purchased as being Toyama nishiki could indeed all be different forms of a variety of similar or in one instance same variegated green and red dissectums. This will be it from me for a while on the issue of Toyama nishiki. Don’t be surprised if I do not answer anyone’s questions anytime soon. I filled in a lot of blanks for some people already with all the above. Now we go back to Kent’s Maple. Jim
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' HI Kent, Here are Toyamas from 2 different sources. The lightest leaved plant was photographed on 4/25/05 and the darker leaved photo was from 5/5/05. Beyond this, both of the plants burned up so there were no further leaves to photograph. Do either of these remind you of your maple? The difference will be is that they are still not stable being 2nd year plants, but maybe the coloring will be close? MJH
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' The coloring on all three of mine the first year looked like the one on the right. The one pictured here was a 5 gal. plant of nice size. The two I received two years ago were newer grafts in one gal. containers. All three of them are mostly green now with alot of the white, red, pink, in the spring mostly but some throughout the entire growing season. I have seen some 'Toyama Nishiki' in nurseries around here do the same thing. Kent Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' This photo of a plant labelled "Toyama Nishiki" was taken in May 05- I have seen several plants of this from 2 different Oregon grower, both in sun (and it did not burn) and shade, that seem to be the green variegated form.
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' My plants looked very much like your picture when I received them. Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' MJH, out of your pictures mine looked more like the one on the right, very much like the picture posted by Silver_Creek. Kent
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' RKBurgess that first photo you posted, Is that tree sick or does it just do that every year? I see the white leaves in green Japanese Maples quite a bit here, just like that. But I usually notice the white leaves are kinda damp feeling, with black dots on the underside and slightly shriviled up with the tips curled. Which always concerns me with early symptoms of vertilicium wilt. Or not! Man you guys sure do know your Maple trees! And it sure is an awesome looking tree. Jim
Re: Acer palmatum dis. 'Toyama Nishiki' No Jim, the tree is very healthy and is doing quite nice. Kent
Hey Kent, can you post some more pictures of your "Toyama Nishiki" (or at least what you THINK is your Toyama Nishiki). It's been some years since you took the last ones and they can change as they get older--I'm curious! David
I just got in a one gallon from Eastfork. It looks absolutely healthy and wonderful (as always she never fails to impress). I'll post a couple of pictures in a few days when it perks up a little bit. David