Trees Gallery - RHS Harlow Carr - page 2

Acer platanoides hybrid

Norway maple hybrid

An unspecified hybrid of the Norway maple, with palmate purple leaves and clusters of yellow flowers. The palmate leaves have teeth on all lobes, and the paired samaras a winged achene, a type of fruit in which a flattened wing of fibrous, papery tissue develops from the ovary wall. are almost at 180 degrees to each other (unlike a. pseudoplatanus where they are about 90 degrees to each other).

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Acer white tigress

White tigress maple

Also known as acer tegmentosum white tigress. A small sized, spectacular Snake Bark with stunning white bark striations and white indumentums a covering of fine hairs on the stem. The foliage displays attractive orange and yellow tints throughout the autumn. The cultivar was developed in America and introduced to the trade in 1995.

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Acer saccharinum 'pyramidalis'

Silver maple

A maple cultivar with broadly pyramidal shape. Native to central and E USA, and SE Canada, it can reach a height of 25m relatively quickly. This one must have been very colourful a month earlier (this is November), but the leaves on the ground still provided a wealth of colour.

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Acer shirasawanum aureum

Golden Full Moon Maple

Named after Japanese botanist Homi Shirasawa (1868-1947), with the Full Moon common name relating to the rounded shape of the leaves. It has red flowers, not yellow as in a. sieboldianum. The variety aureum is probably more common in cultivation than the species. It will grow to 4m, with a shapely rounded canopy. In a prominent island bed near the Old Bath House, this tree provides a fascinating variety across the seasons.

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Acer sieboldianum

Siebold's maple

A medium sized deciduous tree native to the mountainous forest of Japan. It has pale yellow flowers and smooth bark, which distinguish it from a. shirasawanum and a. japonicum. As with all acers, it puts on a dramatic show of colour in autumn.

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Aesculus hippocastanum Baumannii

Baumann's horse chestnut

A double flowering cultivar of the standard horse chestnut. The main branches grow almost horizontally, and because of the relatively soft timber due to rapid growth when young, can break off. The conkers well noted on the species are missing from this sterile cultivar.

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Aronia x prunifolia 'Brilliant'

Chokeberry

A North American hybrid shrub of a. arbutifolia and a. melanocarpa, native to E Canada and to E and C USA. It does grow in places where neither parent is present, which merits acceptance as a full species. Aronia × prunifolia is a branching shrub forming clumps by means of stems forming from the roots. The colour of the fruits give it the common name, along with the astringent, unpalatable (when raw) taste of the berries, which can cause choking. If cooked, however, they are a superfruit, loaded with antioxidants. They are more red than purple on the 'Brilliant' cultivar.

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Betula pendula burrs

Silver birch burrs

A stand of heavily burred unnatural growth caused by the grain growing around a foreign object, a localised virus or a fungus infection birch tree trunks in the woodland area of the garden. Such burrs are highly prized by woodturners for their deepy figured curly grain pattern, and also as veneer material. The burrs often form a crust about six inches thick.

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Betula utilis

Himalayan birch

A native of the W Himalayas, commonly planted as an ornamental tree for its attractive bark. This peels off in broad, horizontal belts, making it very usable for creating even large pages for texts. A fungal growth, locally called bhurja-granthi, can form black lumps on the tree weighing up to 1 kg. Flowering occurs from May–July, with only a few male catkins, and short, single (sometimes paired) female catkins. Fruits ripen in September–October.

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