Botann, it is great to see one of our few remaining large gardens of the Pacific northwest. on a seperate note of fall color I have a link to a garden which was not so lucky. A few years back the property was sold to a housing development. I rescued over 150 different japanese maples from it and other people took the rest. there was probably over 300 japanese maple trees total on the property with some 250 different varieties. The trees were monumental in size including a 20'+ shishigashira. http://doolang.com/garden/ Thanks again Botann,keep up the hard work
Thanks for sharing amazingmaples, that was one beautiful garden, so sad to know it is now gone forever. "Fall" takes on a new meaning in that context. The only (slight) consolation is that so many of the maples were saved. This type of property development at the expense of large gardens is common in the crowded island where I live. I had hoped a spacious country like the U.S. did not suffer from the same problem. Unfortunately the dollar is king and the true worth of a beautiful garden cannot be measured in dollars.
Maf The weird part of this garden is that the land deal fell through so now it is just a big torn up mess and all the trees are now scattered around the region. For me, I started Amazing maples from the trees I dug out of the garden. The garden itself was too much for the people who created it so it was showing neglect when they sold it. I saw from that garden to be careful for what you wish for. With that, big gardens take a huge amount of effort and with that comment I have to tip my hat to Botann to be able to maintain a huge garden. As for loosing ground, in the USA we are loosing our wonderful huge gardens as fast as anywhere.
Id like to thank you guys for those wonderful pictures. Following this thread is like having a feast! Maybe we should do this every year or every season ; ) Here are some interesting ice aged leaves I found in my A. palmatum seedling bed.
On the other hand............ At my mini deck garden I got tasty colors from 'Koto no ito'. 'Mimaye' and an 'Emerald Lace' that is developing a nice shape.
to add orange here are some photos from a couple weeks back of one of my acer palmatum 'shishigashira' Also included is a photo of an Acer palmatum 'Kurabe yama' and an Acer palmatum 'Omura yama'
I am not able to keep up maintaining my garden. It is slowly getting ahead of me. Pruning is becoming more and more time consuming. I'm fairly good and fast at it, but dealing with the branches is the time consuming part.
This has been a most interesting Fall in my garden. Most of the maples are now past their best colors. The japonicums were average, the shirasawanums poor and the palmatums gorgeous with a lot of anthocyanin production. A few are still at their best this weekend like 'Karasu gawa' (first pic) and 'Diane' (second pic). There are also the 'hime' group which are well known to be late and are halfway out, but I cannot explain the freak behavior of two cultivars which today are still perfectly green: 'Beni zuru' (third pic) and 'Sekka yatsubusa' (fourth pic). Unusually this year, in many of the maples the leaves, after drying out, did not drop and stayed in the branches, this is illustrated in pics 5, 6 and 7. This gives an interesting new look to the trees and extends the fall interest. It is probably due to the warm temperatures we have had during November as can be assessed by looking at the rose bouquet I composed today in my rose garden (pics 8, 9) ;o)) Gomero P.S.: All pics were taken today, November 28.
After six weeks or so of autumn colour it is all finished and all leaves are gone in Northamptonshire. The last to change in my garden were 'Kiyohime' and 'Murasaki kiyohime', here is one of them, pictured November 18th and November 23rd: As Gomero says the 'hime' group are known to be late. I believe in my climate we miss the fall colour on these most years; in a normal year we would have had plenty of sub-zero °C nights before November 18th, and the leaves would most likely drop before they fully coloured. This year we are still waiting for anything below +2°C, I didn't chop down my tomato plants till last week!
Here is my last tree to have leaves this fall - Mikawa yatsubusa. Looking forward already to the spring version of this thread
Sorry about the confusion, I meant the winter version of the attractiveness of Japanese maples; effects like bark colors/patterns and trunk/branches structure and tree shape in snow.
That sounds like a good thread too! Unfortunately I only have one or two with much winter bark interest - looking forward to first winter with beni kawa though...
Start the winter bark thread, I have a nice red branched Acer to show you. Well lol it looks red during the day but its totally naked. I need to photograph it first though.
I am surprised that in Belgium you still have so much leaf in the maples you've shown. I wonder about Emery's maples, he is roughly at the same latitude as you. I think it is a good idea, I have initiated a thread like that I do not remember if it was last winter or the one before. Gomero
My Shidiva Gold was the last tree to turn color and lose it's leaves, with my Butterfly close behind.
Help a novice? This is my first attempt at posting a picture. Someone please let me know if this is correct. Leaves of my Aratama this fall.
Fall colors of some of my maples. Hanami nishiki was subtle but nice. Fligree was a bit of a disappointment. Trompenburg was very nice. Shishigashira was late but good. Seiryu was very nice but didn't last long. Hogyoku was just ok. Iijima sunago was ok but first year in the ground.
here is photos of a Acer palmatum "Winter flame" that has fall color and spring color. The same is true about this Acer palmatum "Murakumo" and an Acer palmatum "Japanese sunrise"
