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beloved conifer: japanese umbrella pine

umbrella-pine-springWHEN I CAME TO THIS GARDEN more than 20 years ago, I brought just two plants, tucked into the back of the moving van last-minute by movers who looked at me as if to say, “Really, lady?” One was a clump of dark purple Siberian iris tossed into a recycled produce-store bushel basket; the other a young Japanese umbrella pine I’d had for only a few years and just couldn’t seem to leave behind. Thank goodness I didn’t. Sciadopitys verticillata is the fourth in my series on beloved conifers.

That transplanting of the young umbrella pine will be 23 years ago this fall. At that time, I had never seen another except in botanical-garden collections; unusual or rare was the word. Now they’re at nurseries, but usually quite small and always quite expensive, and they’re pretty easy to kill, at least at first. But what did I know when I uprooted the tree and had it put in that truck?

I was just getting really serious about plants, and was a beginning garden writer, meaning I had the privilege of getting paid to visit gardens and nurseries and interview experts for stories. Those years formed my advanced education in horticulture—and also my downfall in self-control. Everybody showed me or told me about something I simply had to have. Or two or three.

An umbrella pine first spoke to me in a come-hither voice at Planting Fields Arboretum in Oyster Bay, Long Island, a place I’d visited a lot as a teenager that happily became part of my “beat” as garden editor of Long Island-based Newsday newspaper.

umbrella-pine-detailIts needles are arranged in whorls, like the spokes in an umbrella, hence the name (see detail photo). And there’s something else attention-grabbing about the foliage: Visitors to the garden often come to find me to ask about the “tree over there with the plastic-looking needles,” since they’re so thick and lustrous. (Technically, it also has another kind of leaf, the tiny scale leaves on the stems, but nobody notices those, at least not at first.)

That’s the umbrella pine, I say, and it’s not actually a pine at all.

It’s an ancient thing, and like Ginkgo has been around since dinosaur times, also forming the solitary species in its genus and family. Other odd bits: The umbrella pine’s cones take nearly two years to size up after pollination. When experts come here and see how many my tree bears, they always tell me that last fact, to make sure I am properly impressed.

umbrella-pine-conesThe tree, whose foliage is much darker green and sometimes even bronzy in winter (bottom photo), grows to perhaps 30 feet tall and half as wide, and has beautiful reddish bark you never see unless you crawl around beneath. (Which I just did 10 minutes ago to scavenge a couple of cones for that photo, since I cannot reach the ones way up in its topmost section with arm or even lens.)

One year, after very heavy snowfall threatened to disfigure the tree or even break off limbs, friends suggested shearing it one spring, just as the new growth or candles emerged. This gentle tipping back seems to have reduced the umbrella pine’s inclination to get more lax with age, at least for the moment. It also made it more pyramidal in shape.

Umbrella pines hail from cloud forests in Japan, where rainfall and humidity are both high, so don’t expect Sciadopitys to cooperate with drought. Baby it in the first year or two after transplanting, in particular. If you want to grow one in the warmer end of its range (Zones 5 to 7 or 8), protection from the midday sun would be appreciated. Oh, and one more “expert” tip: Skip the stupid moving-van caper I somehow got away with.umbrella-pine

Related posts:

  1. best ‘pine’ cones, ever
  2. slideshow: beloved conifers
  3. beloved conifers: recap of coziest woody plants
  4. beloved conifer: the concolor fir
  5. beloved conifer: chamaecyparis obtusa ‘crippsii’

Comments

  1. Mark says:

    You’re not going to believe this. Last night the Nor’easter blew through Long Island and snapped my speciman Japanese umbrella pine at the BASE of the tree. I love this tree and I’m sick about it. I bought it in August of 2003, it was about 3.5 feet tall … I spent $350 on it (on sale!) … the tree had to be at least 12′. The JUP loved the spot. It really was the best outdoor Christmas tree in the neighborhood. I’m going to try to find some of the cones and see if I can get a new one to grow in the house. How do you think it would stay if I cut it down to about 6′ and used it as our Christmas tree this year?

  2. Margaret says:

    Welcome, Mark. Yes, I can believe this. I have watched my very most precious plants at times over the last 25 years be cut down in freakish weather. Horrible. I am so sorry. I’d keep it very very cold or put it in a bucket of water and cross your fingers. As for growing from seed, ultra-slow (and then slower, even) so not for the home grower, I fear. That’s why they are so expensive I believe…slow. We need to find you a well-priced baby.

  3. Paul says:

    I was investigating which pine trees bear eatable pine seeds and if I might find them in my Maryland neighborhood. What I found was the Pinyon and the (Italian) Stone Pine AKA Umbrella Pine and was led to your site. I suppose the seeds are located in little pockets of the cone. Can you add anything to my findings? THANK YOU. Paul

  4. Margaret says:

    Welcome, Paul. Yes, pine seeds are edible, but most are so small that they are more appealing to birds and animals (squirrels, for instance) than to us. And yes, the seeds are in the little pockets, exactly. The key is getting them out, since you don’t want to wait till the cone opens all the way (which would start to disperse the seeds)…timing is everything, catching them when they are still closed but ripe inside. I have never done this, and only see this one first-hand account of pine-seed harvesting online in a brief look.

  5. Angela Davis says:

    I just heard about the Japanese Umbrella Pine today in my Master Gardener training. I took the cutting home to show its beauty and explain why I need one – I thought an example would help. I heard they were expensive but $350 is crazy! Maybe I’ll see if I can root my cutting and grow my own – think it’ll work?

  6. Margaret says:

    Welcome, Angela. I think you are better off with a small one, which I am seeing more nowadays (not for $350, though larger plants are that much, yes). Try Broken Arrow Nursery for an inexpensive young plant by mail, like $30ish (they have various cultivars).

    They can be propagated from cuttings in the dormant season, but I don’t think it’s easy (and I know it’s not fast). I have not tried and don’t readily find any details information anywhere that is very helpful, sorry to say.

Comment:

The Sister Project

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