...VV is traipsing around Beantown.
Up here to partake of the American Society of Landscape Architects Annual Meeting this week. Except for some overcast weather on a couple days, it has been a good trip and good conference.
Some sightseeing always is in order...
Friday afternoon took me to one of my touchstone sites - the Arnold Arboretum.
Such a treasure! I wish I could spend a day a month for 10 years here, and likely never see things the same way twice. Everyone who loves plants and appreciates age should make a visit here.
Saturday afternoon left an opening to slip out to Mount Auburn Cemetery.
It was pleasantly sunny, albeit brief. I spent more time wandering and not enough time photographing, but I came away inspired by the contemplative mood.
How do you start a trip to Boston with an i hate ny photo?!?!!!!!
No Fenway drive by?
Will have to check out Mt. Auburn and Arnold never been to either - hard to except to be honest.
And you wasted how many years going to Fenway...
I did drive by the Green Monster at least once - but in the dark and at the wheel, so probably wasn't worth the risk of breaking my camera lens.
Thought that first image would be like fingernails on blackboard...
Yep, you got our attention, VV.
Get this, my last job was a short walk from the Arnold Arboretum. Lunchtime was, ho hum, do I see the lilacs, the rhodis, the conifers or the bonsai? I have never seen larger ilex opacas than there, either. It is also fun to try to find a specific plant in their collection because their numbering system works so well. Only caveat is that food isn't allowed.
I'd love to see both places.....maybe some day! VV, my son is also a landscape architect, he works for an engineering firm here in CT......
I knew there was thought behind that first pic :)
Isn't that the welcome mat to New England? Hmmm...
Got a lot more images like that one in the tunnel, while heading out of town Monday evening.
That took me down to the Cape - Brewstah - where I spent some wonderful time with an amazing fellow Holly Society of America member. Who here has questions about Ilex?
Say no more...
Edited for plant IDs...
Ha! Edited to say I remembered the yellow sport's name...
1. Ilex x 'Liberty'
2. Ilex aquifolium 'Proud Mary'
3. Ilex x 'Buttercup' (the yellow sport of 'Nellie Stevens' that I can't remember the name of)
4. Ilex aquifolium 'Pinto'
5. Ilex x 'Sparkleberry'
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thanks for sharing the beautiful pictures
I'm a holly novice. I have no idea what species the first four pics are, but they are bursting with health so of course I want them too. Any IDs?
Love that variegated holly!
I'm going to have to look them up, and see if I even have an ID for them. I'll edit the image above, so successive posts seem out of place.
I can't get enough of the variegated one (which I do remember): that's 'Pinto'.
Pinto is the perfect name.
Bill's collection has so many fine old specimens, as well as novel new selections I've never seen and can only hope to give a fighting chance in the relatively hostile environment here at the Valley. But, isn't that what much of gardening is about?
I think I'll use that - Ilex x Unrequited Optimism...
Editing out the obnoxious symbols...
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Here are more fun and fine plants - down theyah in Brewstah...
1. Ilex serrata 'Longwood Firefall'
2. Buxus yellow variegated sport
3. Ilex opaca 'Mrs. Santa'
4. Ilex colchica
5. Ilex x 'S. K. H.'
Can you stand another round?
1. Buxus harlandii
2. Ilex x 'Red Beauty'
3. Ilex aquifolium 'Cascade'
4. Ilex verticillata 'Golden Verboom'
5. Ilex x 'Yule Brite'
Several more samples...
1. Ilex opaca unnamed seedling
2. Ilex x 'Nellie Stevens'
3. Ilex x meserveae 'Golden Girl'
4. Magnolia x loebneri 'Dr. Merrill'
5. Metasequoia glyptostroboides
All of these on one property? Amazing. Just keep the pics coming, VV! I admire the structure of the Loebneri magnolia. I despair about zone and space, especially on a windy cold day like today, but it's still better to enjoy these beauties and know they live somewhere.
Lovely hollies......love Mrs. Santa's bright red berries.....
Yes - all on one property, a lifetime of a man's work (supported by an extremely understanding woman, of course).
I can't remember if he has an acre there - not much more than that, if that. Just a darn good grower, and these plants are not widely spaced there. He is a good landscape editor as well; if it doesn't measure up, out it goes.
Another batch:
1. Ilex cornuta 'China Doll'
2. Ilex aquifolium 'J. C. van Tol'
3. Ilex crenata 'Geisha'
4. Ilex pedunculosa
5. Ilex opaca 'Cardinal'
VV nice red sox............red berries - impressive
Weee. It's a fun ride.
Well, the Sox include a lot of luck. Bill is just good.
Let this be inspiration to consider joining the Holly Society of America...
http://www.hollysocam.org/index.html
1. Avenue of Champions
2. Ilex aquifolium 'Duquette'
3. Ilex x altaclarensis 'Camelliafolia'
4. Ilex purpurea
5. Avenue of Champions-in-waiting
Very enticing. I've never seen a camellia with leaves quite like camelliafolia, though. Does someone go around and cut off the pointy parts? Purpurea looks unusual, too, with its very tiny serrations.
All those are unusual to a fellow who is pretty intimate with Ilex opaca, Ilex decidua, and Ilex verticillata - but not most of those more tender evergreen types that are common to zones 6b/7a and warmer.
I know....wish I was in zone 7!
Zone 7 envy is pretty strong with me too. That's why I keep trying to pretend I have it, but recent weather reveals the lie even with warmer microclimates in certain spots. I suppose some of the more tender hollies would survive polyprolylene wrappers and christmas lights. If they can grow palm trees in Miami of Ohio campus, anything must be possible.
Wow....I didn't know that...guess if you wrap & heat the plants, they will survive a few zones colder....I really worried about my camellia on Sunday, even though I wrapped it in burlap......
That's why I have a garage microclimate at the moment--only freezing when the temp is close to zero, but they stayed on my front porch just a few hours too long.
Hope they come back, Rosemary.....
Thanks. As consolation I have been looking at pictures of the so-called possemhaw deciduous holly. I'm looking for something that has a few more berries than most of my h. verticillatas because of dappled shade. I had been hoping camellias would work as foundation plants but I think now that they'll be pets in pots for a long time instead.
Possumhaw Holly (Ilex decidua) is a fine upstanding plant. It is native down here in the Ohio River valley, but a long way from home up northeast.
I would still say give it a try. It is a much bigger plant than Winterberry Holly (Ilex verticillata) - more in the size range of a crabapple, redbud, or dogwood.
Then I could be like the stray bird that drops a seed if I plant one.
Do you suppose they fruit better in some shade compared to the serratas and verticillata hybrids? I'm still fixing the male consorts too since Southern Gentleman is currently the only surviving one of its kind and not very large.
I don't know that they will do any better or any worse in shade than the shrubby winterberry hollies. Quality/quantity of fruiting depends solely on numbers of flowers available to be appropriately pollinated, and that usually increases with exposure to sunlight.
So......if your female plant puts out - the flowers, that is - and your male plant obliges likewise (and at the same time, mind you), and you have active pollinators like bees, flies, wasps to do the heavy lifting - then you should go forth and be fruitful.
Know that Ilex decidua overlaps in bloom time with Ilex opaca here in the Ohio River valley - not with Ilex verticillata, which blooms quite a bit later. I'll attach a handy comparison bloom time chart compiled by one of the giants of Holly-dom from southwest Indiana - the late Bob Simpson.
Thanks for the Bob Simpson chart, VV. I guess in a few few years I may know which cultivars to pull out. Bonfire might have missed the pollinating moment, but Shaver has no such excuse.
If deciduas are pollinated by opacas, that could be useful.
That's what I would have guessed - that you have lots of Ilex opaca about your neighborhood, less Possumhaw Holly overall.
Next big destructive nor'easter, you won't complain about all the sudden sunshine! It'll just mean better flowering for all your hollies.
There's always an Ilex Silver Lining...
Edited to remove gibberish symbols
This message was edited Nov 29, 2013 9:44 AM
True, we never have to wait too long for more sunlight.
Wonderful photos, thank you. I wonder since the cape has water on both sides, if in spite of being the same zone, it would be warmer for plants than up here on the north side. By the way, our arrowood type viburnums were naturalized here when we bought the property 40 yrs ago.
New England weather is clearly not all alike. One of the holly books I'm reading suggests aquaperni hollies for New England, but most of them are listed for zone 7 or 6b at best. Same source said the camelliafollium hollies are for sourthern gardens, only, but here in this tread is one thriving on the Cape.
