Just bought this last year, it has more than doubled in size, it was less than 2 ft now it is over 5 ft.
Smoke Tree
I had a gorgeous purple smoke tree that grew an outrageous amount in one year- simply amazing.
Then during a heavy rain the thing just fell over and showed me that all it's development had been topside and that the roots were severely lacking. I don't know why it grew as it did but despite constantly propping it up and staking and pruning the tree never was right.
I no longer trust extreme growth :)
But yours is lovely!
I hope to try one again someday... in a different spot.
Cearbhaill, Thanks for telling me about your Smoke Tree, now if that happens to mine I'll know what to do.
My mother had one in her yard. It grew to be a big tree. I wish I could have gotten a sapling before the place was sold.
Marie, I bought this at Lowe's last year. I noticed in the Spring they had some Smoke Tree's in fairly small size's.
This tree is only suppose to grow to around 25 feet, I hope that is true, because if it gets bigger it will have to go.
No, that is about how big hers got. But they are so pretty when they bloom.
Cearbhaill, I'm sorry to hear about your Smoke Tree, How long did you have this Smoke Tree, and how big was the Tree?
Mine was installed in October of '07 as a barely one foot plant from Lowe's- it was all of $2.95.
By the fall of '09 it was maybe eight feet tall and that's when it fell over. Unfortunately we didn't take a lot of photos that year- I can't easily locate one of it at its peak height.
I had originally purchased two but one of them reverted to green- I still have that one although it hasn't grow nearly as quickly as the one that stayed purple. The green one is maybe six feet tall now.
I was just looking at my Smoke Tree, and it is turning green now, it did that last year, and then in early Spring it is Purple
I don't know if that's natural or not. New growth is coming out Purple.
Cearbhaill, It seems so strange what happened to your Smoke Tree, I guess stranger things has happened before.
Do you know if if your Tree had any kind of a trunk ? I don't if that has anything do with anything , but mine has about 3" tall trunk,and about 3" around. Also I was wondering if you had a lot of heavy wind at that time? I'ved been concerned about high winds here, and if would knock over my Smoke Tree, so far the winds haven't been to bad here yet.
Yes, it had a trunk.
No excessive wind. It just fell over after a heavy rain and we propped it back up. For a while we put heavy rocks over the roots to try and keep it from falling over but eventually gave up and tore it out.
That's when we saw the unnaturally tiny root ball.
I didn't realize how green my Smoke Tree was in this picture, until now. I know it was purple at least a week before this picture taken , because I was showing my DH the Tree and how dark the purple was. I keep looking out the door all the time to see if its still standing.
I can't even express how much I LOVE mine! It is the most unusual purple. There is simply nothing else that draws the "ooohhhs and ahhhs like it does. I wonder if the shade of purple is affected by the amount of sun like my purple leaf Redbud? My landscaper asked me if I trim mine back and I do by about 2/3 and trim out oldest wood. He mentioned that most people don't and that's why they end up not liking them but he didn't tell me what happens...
I have 2, one is about 8 feet tall & is in full sun, the color is a beautiful purple. The one I have that is partilly shaded by a sugar maple; has a little purple in it but the majority of the leaves are green. I got both of my plants from Burgess S & P Co., for about $3.99 each. They were about 12 to 18 inches high. They grew very fast for me. They were well established in size in about 3 years. The one that is shaded by the S M, I am trying to train it into a bush form. We love the color of both.
In order to get the most of our 'smoke trees' I've found these need full sun. In partial shade, mine (about half a dozen of them) are not very showy as they could possibly be. Yours is gorgeous roseycats. The location is perfect where it gets all the sun light it needs. Great job!