Chubese Toona, Chinese Cedrela, Chinese Mahogany

Pass Christian Z9a. I have 4 trees grown from seeds. The biggest is 4 ft. tall and, I think, 3 years old. The small ground planted tree...Read More dropped leaves during a summer hot spell, but recovered as conditions moderated. Keep in mind that my water table is down about 20 ft., my soil lacks humus, and it's difficult to maintain moisture in my soil. I put a containerized specimen with its base always in water, and the leaves maintained in 100 F . This showed me that the problem was lack of moisture with the ground-planted one....not high temperature. It's also tolerating soil ph of 5.5

I admired a specimen of this plant at the University of KY campus for decades, until it was lost to a new building that took it's site....Read Morer />
Chinese Toon will never be a common name rolling off of the average gardener's tongue. It resembles for all the world a peeling-barked Ailanthus, which is not generally a winner in anyone's book. I can't say I ever noticed it when it flowered in all those years, but what I liked about this plant were the interesting dried husks left over after the seeds were released.

I've posted a picture of some of those husks that I collected over 10 years ago. They make great dried decorations (if your cats don't get them).

This tree has been mentioned as very tolerant of landscape extremes, and for having been used as a street tree in such diverse locations as Santa Barbara CA; Philadelphia PA; and Paris, France. So, there you go.

This edit added in June 2009: I traveled through Rochester NY in fall 2008, and at Durand-Eastman Park there are some wonderful groves of Chubese Toona. I didn't find many seed husks that I like so much; maybe there are a lot of playful cats there. Regardless, these were happy uncared-for trees hanging out in the woods with oaks, maples, and a lot of other trees. This park is on relatively sandy glacial soil on the shores of Lake Ontario, probably a solid zone 6a/5b.