Identification: Unknown sargentii hybrid, was Syodoi - mid-season, single-white, double-serrated

[Edited by wcutler 2011aug3: comments removed no longer relevant after thread reorganization]

With respect to P. serrulata var. spontanea, I could be convinced that many of the unknowns in East Van (500-600 blk E 27, 800 blk E 26, 1100-1200 blk E 13, etc.) are this cherry. I'd like to see whether the leaf back is whitish (which would be a good indicator). The aforementioned are for sure not P. sargentii, as the inflorescences are corymbose, not umbellate—warmer weather will show this better—and the bud scales aren't particularly sticky, either.

 

Re: P.serrulata var.spontanea - Single pinky white, early mid-season, round shape

This is the "Festival Favourite sargentii" you're talking about? Douglas, it doesn't sound like you're ready to rename it, or are you? Shall I just pull it? Rename it to "unknown" and one of us (you?) can write a little disclaimer in [edited by wcutler:what is now] Kensington-Cedar Cottage??

 

Re: P.serrulata var.spontanea - Single pinky white, early mid-season, round shape

For sure, this is not P. sargentii. I can certainly understand why it's a favourite. These are beautiful trees. Unfortunately, I need a bit more time to work it out. It would be nice if I could see some fully expanded leaves.

 

Re: P.serrulata var.spontanea - Single pinky white, early mid-season, round shape

It's going to be Rampant Whatzits until we get a better name for these. [edited 20090712 by wcutler: based on discussions with Douglas, we're now going with Yama-zakura, which is the Japanese name for the title of this tread, for the ones in this posting, except the Sargentii in VanDusen]. We decided to compare a bunch of cuttings Anne had with the tree marked as Sargentii in VanDusen Botanical Gardens. We didn't really think it was Sargentii, so Anne wanted to compare the blossoms with her Rampant Whatzit cuttings. The third photo is the VanDusen tree, except for the blossom touching Anne's hand. The fourth photo is one of her cuttings. The fifth photo shows both, the one in the small vase obviously the cutting. We thought they looked pretty similar.


We also had a look at the trees outside VanDusen on Oak Street, marked Spire. They're clearly not Spire. The third photo is a comparison with Anne's cuttings. I can't tell if these trees are the same as the Rampant Whatzits. Don't these look like the trees at 3rd and Balsam, the fourth set of photos in the first posting, underneath the VanDusen trees?

 

Prunus x syodoi 'Shodo-zakura'? - mid-season, single-white, double-serrated leaves

Anne Eng has done a sterling job of documenting these leaves. Whatever they are, these trees all appear to be the same, or at least not clearly different from each other. This is not what I would call "Serration single", which is what Kuitert says Yama-zakura should have. The leaf back of the one on E 6th doesn't seem so whitish here, but it did seem whitish in my photo. These are all Anne's photos.

• trees in Killarney Park (paragraph numbered "5",
• the trees Joseph found on Graveley, in Hastings-Sunrise
• some of the young ones on E 6th in Hastings-Sunrise
• the ones on E 13th in ,
• the one inside VanDusen in the NE corner marked Sargentii,
• and the ones on Oak outside VanDusen (in same posting as previous one)

They also appear to not be the same as what we think is Sargentii at QE Park.

 

Re: P.serrulata var.spontanea - Single pinky white, early mid-season, round shape

Sheila Petrie has sent me these photos of the Quilchena Park leaves. She wrote:

Sheila Petrie has sent me these photos of the Quilchena Park leaves. They don't seem quite the same to me as all those others I posted here yesterday, but I'm not sure. These seem to have some areas of single serration. Sheila says the back of the leaves were lighter than the top sides, though it's not so obvious in the photos.
Quilchena Park


Sheila also sent along photos of a Sargentii at UBCBG for comparison.

 

Re: Yama-zakura? Single whites, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid-season

Judging from the leaves of these plants, which are clearly doubly serrate and endowed with sizable teeth, I suggest they might represent a P. sargentii x P. incisa hybrid. Such hybrids are known under the name P. x syodoi. It appears that most, if not all the individual trees recorded in these pages are the same clone. It would be interesting to know the origin (i.e., was it Japan or somewhere local?).

 

Re: Yama-zakura? Single whites, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid-season

I found a Japanese page with photos of P. x syodoi. Here's the Google translation. The reference to Mamezakura is P. incisa. It's described as being a small tree, though. Douglas thought it must be a hybrid and not just P. incisa because P. incisa is supposed to be a small tree.

Here's another page with photos, from Japan but posted in English.
Photos on a Japanese Botanical Garden page


I don't think we have any leaf photos of Washi-no-o. I'll see what I can do.

 

Re: Yama-zakura? Single whites, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid-season

Looks more delicate, with slender shoots and flower stalks - as might be expected from the (assumed) parentage.

 

Re: Yama-zakura? Single whites, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid-season

Evidently, the City of Vancouver purchased them in 1973 from Traas Nursery, a local propagator of apple, pear and cherry rootstocks and grower of deciduous trees. Unfortunately, the nursery is now defunct and I haven't been able to locate the proprietor to ask about these trees.

 

Re: Yama-zakura? Single whites, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid-season

'Washi-no-o' is supposed to be so fragrant. Sheila Petrie posted of a single tree in Kerrisdale: "The single white blossoms are very fragrant ... think baby powder". No-one has mentioned scent for any of these unknown trees that we're trying to identify now, even where there were several together on a block.

I'll still try to get a leaf photo.

 

Re: Yama-zakura? Single whites, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid-season

Washi-no-o is out. Here's Anne Eng's sterling work again. You can see that the Washi-no-o leaf does not have the "doubly serrate and ... sizable teeth" of the ones we're trying to identify - Anne has used the tree at 13th and Clark for comparison.



[Edited 2011aug03 by wcutler - unable to copy the posting in here]
On September 6, 2009, Sheila Petrie sent along nicely documented photos from two trees in Kerrisdale, which are looking quite similar to Anne's Washi-no-o leaves and are also not looking like the doubly serrated ones we're trying to identify.

 

Re: Syodoi? Not Yama-zakura - Single white, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid

I'd like to propose that we call the trees with the pinkish-white flowers and coarsely serrated leaves Prunus x syodoi 'Shodo-zakura'. I haven't seen any evidence that would suggest these trees could be anything else. The flowers and timing seem to fit and those leaves are just way too distinctive.

Regarding size, the trees on Graveley (see Joseph's photos) are grafted on 1.5m mazzard (P. avium) understocks. If one subtracts half of the understock height and considers that mazzard roots probably confer considerable vigour to the cultivar, then the height quoted on Japanese web sites (i.e., to 5 m) is not out of line. My only question would be the crown habit, which is listed in the Manual of Japanese Cherries as "umbrella shaped," and which most of the plants aren't, but I think this, too, could be an age and grafting effect. Look at P. x yedoensis cultivars, for example. They only attain the umbrella shape after many years.

I am (as ever) open to other arguments.

 

Re: Syodoi? Not Yama-zakura - Single white, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid

Douglas, I can’t understand why you think whatzit in Killaney is Prunus x syodoi ‘Shodo-zakura’ so much. Yes, leaves are almost the identical and it has single white flowers. But we can’t identify cherries without checking flowers and calyx, sepals, pedicels, peduncles, bracts and bud scales thoroughly.

I searched about Shodo-zakura in web. I couldn't find anything in English, but I found several sites in Japanese.

Then I found pictures of flowers, buds and a tree from afar (bottom of the site)in the site of Nikko Botanical Garden. When I saw the flower picture, I thougt Shodo-zakura is different from one in Killaney. Young leaves of Shodo-zakura are green not brown or reddish green. I couldn’t translate the pages into English using Google translation. In case you can't see Japanese pages. I copied the pictures and attach them here.
View attachment 76280 View attachment 76281 View attachment 76282

Even if you enlarge the pictures of the link of Wendy’s #16, you can see they have green young leaves.

Shodo–zakura (in Chinese Character; win-road-cherry) is a natural hybrid of Mame-zakura and Sargentii which you can see rarely in Nikko area (2 hours’ train-ride from Tokyo to North). Nikko in Chinese character is Sun-light. The name of Shodo came from the Buddhist monk who first opened the temple in Nikko. The original tree of Shodo-zakura was said to be transplanted to Nikko Botanical Garden from near by when the garden was made as a cold region garden for Tokyo University.
It is a small tree (up to 5 M) and branches grow sideways. Also it grows slowly. It has plenty of big white flowers. They bloom hanging down.It blooms very long time. Styles have no hair but sometimes one flower has several styles.calyx is narrow vase shape and base part is slightly swollen and have a little hair. Sepals are lozenge-oval shape(?) and smooth edged. (I translated from the site of National Institute of Genetics.)


Then what is whatzit in Killaney? It is a very difficult question. I think there are a lot of possibilities. We should think about Yama-zakura again. I wrote “flower size is too big to be wild cherry (Yama-zakura)†at #7, but after I came back to Japan, I saw many sites. Now I know Yama-zakura varies very much. Some of them have small flowers a bit but some have plenty of big flowers. Some bloom before Somei-yoshino and some after Somei-yoshino. Also I read leaves can be double serration. I saw the picture at the library (not as grand as ones in Killaney). I will see many Yama-zakura this April. Then I’ll post them.
But the possibility of being a hybrid of Sargentii is still big. Because there are Sargentiis in Vancouver. There might be a hybrid between Sargentii and Avium.
When we talk about leaves, Mame-zakura, Kanhi-zakura and Takane-zakura have double serrations in Gakken’s Flowering Cherries in Japan (Written in Japanese). Flowers of those trees are different but it might be a hybrid of one of those.
Also I feel pictures of ‘Tagui-arashi’ resemble to the flowers of Killarney ( or more to one in Quilchena Park?). Japanese Flowering Cherries by Kuitert says “Serration rather fine, single and with gland†(p 328) But I found the site which says there are single and double serration. But Google didn’t translate the page. (I think there are too much information in small letters) So I can’t prove it. The site was run by National Institute of Genetics, Japan, using the research of the late Dr. Y. Takenaka. He is famous for the breeding experiment of Somei-Yoshino.

Anyway I think we have to wait the blooming season and check flowers and back of flowers thoroughly. Also we should compare the one in Quilchena Park with one in Killaney Park. (I think the Whatzit in Quilchena Park has Witches’ Broom and the disease made the tree shape funny and less flowers.)

 

Re: Syodoi? Not Yama-zakura - Single white, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid

Here are Gakken vol 10 page references, for anyone who has the same version of that book:

kanhi-zakura p 60;
kanhi-zakura x yama-zakura p 59
Mame-zakura p 40
Takane-zakura p 44

 

Re: Syodoi? Not Yama-zakura - Single white, bronze leaves, large dense tree, late mid

Mariko,

Perhaps I was a bit rash. What you suggest (making a closer study of the flowers) is sensible. We have a good set of leaf images (thanks to Anne Eng). We now need to make a similar catalogue of flowering shoots from these unknowns.

My gut feeling is that these plants are derived from a seedling or group of seedlings from a cross with P. sargentii (sticky buds and whitish leaf backs) and P. incisa or P. nipponica (deep marginal serrations). There are plenty of "unknown" crosses with coarsely serrated leaves recognized in Japan. Another one is 'Gamman-zakura'.

It's of course a possibility, but I doubt we have a Prunus avium x P. sargentii hybrid here. Such a cross would show a reflexed calyx (to some degree at least) and be much more vigorous than these trees.

 

Catalog of single white, mid-season, double-serrated leaves emerge with blossoms

For five of these trees, we (that's mostly Anne Eng) will be collecting and posting photos of tree, buds, blossoms, green leaves and autumn leaves. We will have one location per posting and will edit the posting to include missing photos. Those nice trees outside VanDusen are to be taken down for the new building, so we will not include those.

 

Quilchena Park across from Marguerite House at 4759 Valley Drive

Quilchena Park across from Marguerite House at 4759 Valley Drive

These are the trees Sheila Petrie posted, and mostly the photos from her postings in 2008. Sheila told me the trees were in bloom yesterday, but the heavy wind and rain has done them in, as there are only a few blossoms left today.

 

E 48 Avenue and Killarney Street.

E. 48 Avenue and Killarney Street. Three trees on northwest corner, one just north of trio, by Arbor vitae. Three more further west at E.48 and Raleigh.

 

Graveley Street, between Kaslo and Renfrew Streets

Graveley Street, between Kaslo and Renfrew Streets, ten trees both sides.

 

E. 27 Avenue, between Fraser and St. George Streets

E. 27 Avenue, between Fraser and St. George Streets, both sides.



[Edited by wcutler: I'm adding photos from March 24]:
Here's a set from one small tree that doesn't appear to be heading for the size of the older ones on the block, but it did yield a leaf photo


And another tree


And a tree that is more Sargent-looking

 

Balsam at 3rd, northwest corner

Balsam at 3rd, northwest corner

The first three photos were taken by Joseph Lin on March 8, 2008. I took the other the day before that. These are nice-looking trees.

 

Re: Catalog of single white, mid-season, double-serrated leaves emerge with blossoms

I have a theory about these unknowns. In the late 1970s and 1980s I worked at Massot (wholesale) Nursery in Richmond. We regularly sold a tree we called Korean hill cherry. Yesterday, while driving in east Vancouver, I stopped to look at a familiar looking tree on Nanaimo Street that I'm convinced is what we sold as Korean hill.

Korean hill cherry is known in the scientific literature as Prunus speciosa var. pubescens (or P. serrulata var. pubescens). This species is described as "variable," but usually exhibiting pubescent (hairy) flower stalks, petioles and leaf backs. According to Kuitert (Japanese Flowering Cherries), "the mature leaves have a rather coarse serration." Ah.

Korean hill is a common species in Japan and evidently hybridizes freely with Prunus speciosa var. spontanea (Japanese hill cherry) and P. sargentii wherever the ranges of those species overlap with it. Korean hill is reputed to be somewhat smaller and more umbrella shaped than Japanese hill with smaller flowers and emerging leaves green to bronze.

As far as I can tell, many of the unknown trees exhibit hairy petioles, pedicels and leaf backs, although the pubescence is mostly slight and very difficult to see. The trees exhibit a range of characteristics that suggest hybridization and I'm now sure that many of the unknowns are hybrids of Korean and Japanese hill cherries and probably also P. sargentii. I'll bet that these trees are derived from hybrid seed collected from P. speciosa var. pubescens trees in Japan, then brought to Vancouver. The original seedlings serving as scion material for the grafted plants we (and others) sold as Korean Hill cherry.

 

Re: Catalog of single white, mid-season, double-serrated leaves emerge with blossoms

"Sold as Korean Hill Cherry" is such an awkward name.

What'll we call it? "Vancouver Korean Hill Cherry"? And the botanical name (on the top of the page in the book) be Prunus speciosa var. Vancouver? Or "Massot Korean Hill Cherry" Or just Korean Hill Cherry /Prunus speciosa var. pubescens? And it will just be another one of that tree's variations?

 

Re: Catalog of single white, mid-season, double-serrated leaves emerge with blossoms

For those trees that are intermediate with the Korean and Japanese varieties, I think we're safe in referring to them simply as Prunus speciosa. The P. sargentii hybrids (if that's what they are) are a different matter. However, we might just call the lot of them "yama-zakura" (from "ke-yama-zakura"—Korean mountain cherry, "yama-zakura"—(Japanese) mountain cherry, and "o-yama-zakura"—big mountain cherry. That is, unless our Japanese friends consider this unacceptably ambiguous. I'm going to start calling all of them "hill cherries."