Cheering ourselves up with Maples

Thanks everyone for your pictures. When I watch them, I feel like moving away from the couch, turning the tv and the computer off and go outside ;°)

Went out to buy some tomato plants yesterday, they didn't have a lot of choice, and no cougettes (I love the yellow ones), but I could buy some "Coeur de boeuf", "St Pierre", "Cobra", and a pot of cherry-tomatoes.

And when looking for a bag of cement - they were out of stock, I saw some maples, among them a couple of cheap (19.90€) Acer shirasawanum 'Aureum'. Who could resist? I had one that I lost in the dreadful 2011 winter, so now my small trees have a new companion :



'Peaches and Cream' with flowers :



'Deshojo'. Not so bright as last week, with a petal from a wild cherry :



'Atrolineare', with flowers :



'Dissectum Atropurpureum' of some kind. It's grafted and was not labelled when I bought it, but it's definitely dissected and holds a dark red colour long when in full sun :




'Beni Komachi', a "raft/forest" I inherited from a friend. On some shoots, some of the leaves are not as serrated, or even "lace-leafed" as they are supposed to be. Some suggested that I should remove these twigs, but its former owner told me just to cut out the leaves, and on the second flush, they usually come back to the type, contrary to variegated cultivars when it's better to suppress the whole twig/branch when the leaves revert to green :

 

Huh huh...

A very surprising "official" name: was the "inventor" a fan of Christie Moore or what ?

I like it... ;°)

 

Hi AlainK, first of all how many times do we go out with a list and come home with a maple but nothing on the list, I know I do !! I get told off too many times to count. Your new Aureum is vibrant but then again so are all your others so it fits in perfectly. The Autrolineare is very special, I absolutely love it.
You are right the photos people are putting on here is inspiring. Thankyou.

 

We've got a proverb : "Quand on aime, on ne compte pas", more or less "When you love, you don't count (yur money, your involvement)". It's always so hard to translate expressions that have different layers of meanings.

When I was still a teacher, I had put a banner above the whiteboard :

"Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts."

Alfred Einstein.

 

I gave up counting a long time ago !!! And listening according to my wife!!!!!!!!

 

OK you lot !!!! won't tell you again your going back indoors , you have had three days in the sun look how cold it's getting now , they were a lot easier getting out than putting back in !!!! roll on May.

 

Brilliant photo ROEBUK, that has given us here a chuckle. Oh May, then we will start worring about the heat. Does it ever end!!! Do hope our trees appreciate everything we do for them.

 

Earlier I mentioned Westonbirt to emery, I then found my Westonbirt Orange making an appearance. So thought I would share it. My Westonbirt Red is still a bit tardy so that's to follow another day.

 

The car is now sat in the drive way in the back garden and the garage is full of the larger containerised trees 50 to 80 ltrs plus, took well over an hour to swap everyone about so i have around 40 trees now in two garages and my workshop, glad i did this have just been outside and the car is nicely frosting over !! every thing was just leafing out so hopefully i have helped with damage limitation for this week , think they will be staying there for a while , every one else in the ground your on your own !!

 

I took my chances last night and just wrapped small trees and the seedlings..with 95% of mine out it impractical to wrap them all..no frost here fortunately

 

Well done dicky5ash and ROEBUK, mine got hit but not too bad, I have 90% out so a bit impractical also. Fingers crossed for tonight, then looks all ok after that . A beautiful sunny Spring morning though, dont you agree?

 

Certainly did the right thing last night we had a bitterly cold night and the same forecast again for this evening , think i might leave them in the garages until June at this rate :):) all the trees in the ground look ok but have a Hesse which was well in leaf and that doesn't look to happy and tonight isn't going to help it much , the joy's of growing maples eh!!

 

Think our garden will look like the Swiss alps in mid winter after my wife and I place white fleece over everything this evening. But Maples are worth it.
Hope your Cornus gets through ok. Warm weather Wednesday onwards!!!!?

 

My 2 baby 3ft Ukgumo’s have come out to play looking nice and white this year ..whilst my 9 footer is being more shy..it has has sense..

Unrelated but I have noticed some random larger throwback leaves on my Beni schichihenge, not seen them on this tree and I’ve had it years ..only very small proportion and on stems with true form leaves..
Last year this cultivar did not colour up vibrant pink, I think I had it in a slightly more shady position..fine balance...the pic below was year before last.

 

It was cold last night but maybe a little warmer here than up north. I didn't see a frost, and no obvious damage in the garden, though the shredding from the hail the other day makes it hard to tell! :) Ah, gardening with maples, not for the weak-of-liver! :

Checking for frost on the tables I took a few of things that are now coming out there, these are mostly small plants and young grafts., really just some quick snaps this morning.


'Red Feather '

A. distylum

A. pictum 'Kamasaka nishiki'

A. discolor, Italian source, maybe the real thing??

'Dentelle de Binche'

'Cosmos', not really showing the variegation yet

'Red pygmy'

A. takisimense

'Demi Sec'

'Tsuma gaki'

A. morifolium

A. cappadocicum ssp sinicum var tricaudatum

Unknown, maybe Aratama?

Nice pseudosieboldianum hybrid selection

Nice gold palmatum selection

 

Ukigumo's really brighten a darker area of a garden, we love them. Great photos.
Beni schichihenge seems to enjoy a lot more sun to show it's true colouring. We have found this with all our bi coloured maples. Now and again we do take out reverting leaves to keep the colour we all like. Butterfly is one of those that tries to revert, so we keep an eye on it through growing season.

 

Hi emery, think your right you have escaped the dreaded April frost, but I expect you have other problems, ie Deer. Poor ROEBUK in West Yorkshire I think is the farthest North on this forum, such patience!!

'Great photos again'. Babies for planting out this Autumn?
Cappadocicum ssp sinicum var tricaudatum is a very interesting acer. Yours must be quite young as I believe it has rather large leaves.
Think it might be another week or so to see if the unknown is Aratama. Cant see the tell tell green yet. Lovely maple though.

 

Yes deer are a constant problem! Both roe deer and white tail, they can do a tremendous amount of damage. We get the occasional hare but they're quite solitary, so not so many. Lots of boar but they don't seem to care about maples.

Lucky we have a freezer filled with venison, we always call it "Maple Fed" which sounds exotic, and sugary, but is mostly just plain fact... So we do get our revenge.

None of these will be ready for planting next year, except perhaps the tricaudatums and the maybe-aratama. (I'm crap at ID-ing most JMs, so any help there would be more than welcome.) I never plant smaller than 12l, which usually takes a small plant 3 years anyway.

var tricaudatum is identical to ssp sinicum with the exception of the bases of the leaf, which are missing the basal lobes of ssp sinicum. If it makes any fruit I will be interested in seeing whether it is the beautiful carmine red of ssp sinicum, which is one of the most showy trees throughout the year. I've acquired a ssp divergens which seems true, but haven't photographed it yet.

Still slowly leafing out here, some of the JMs have barely started, but I'll have some pictures of others soon.

 

A lot of our JM's are very slow this year, although I see Jaybee63 who is closer to the coast has a lovely show already. I expect zfrittz with his warmth is almost in Summer colour now. Our US friends seem to be at different stages as well. I saw Charlie from Amazing Maples today on YouTube and his are all quite slow this year.

Good to hear your freezer is full of venison lol.

Look forward to more photos from everyone soon. Loving all this!!

 

It is very strange that Northamptonshire and Midlands are ahead of Hampshire, you would expect the opposite. Although if the majority of yours are in the ground that would explain it..I have about 75 trees all are out now after our weekend of good weather apart from one or two now.

 

Hi dicky5ash, yes agreed it is strange, I think Luke in Oxford is also ahead of mine.
I've just covered all of mine except the large ones for hopefully the last frost of Spring tonight.
Hope your enjoying this thread as much as I am, it is really good for us all to lose ourselves in the world of Acers when everything in the world is not too nice atm.
Am hoping to see more lovely maple photos from more UBC members in the coming days.

 

Oh to have deer problems emery.... :) to live in the country a field full of maples and deer problems , that's my dream scenario, must buy a lotto ticket ah !!

 

Hey ROEBUK, totally agree, my wife has been looking at properties in France after buying a lotto ticket today.We can dream!!!!!

 

bloodgood in full sun. this was last year though!

It's just leafing out now.

 

Hi vbx, lovely photo of Bloodgood in the Californian sun. We have a frost here atm, something you dont have to think about in April I'm sure. There is something about a bright sky that always makes for a lovely photo and you have definitely shared two with us all , thankyou.