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Tue, Apr 10, 12 at 10:45
| Does anyone on this forum know of a reference book that deals with important emerging landscape trees? I recall reading about one of a forum (this one I believe) that was scheduled to be published, but now I can't find any information about it. I've got Dirr's manual, and I recently ordered 'North American Landscape Trees' and 'Trees for Urban and Suburban Landscapes'. I'm looking for a book that lists foreign trees and discusses their potential for use in the US. Thanks for any input! |
Follow-Up Postings:
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| Dirr I seldom look at, for various reasons but the Jacobson is unusually well done. However, it came out in 1996 and will not have any new trees. The third one I don't know. Have not seen any that fits what you are asking for, the information seems like the kind of thing you would get off the internet anyway. New North American introductions for instance are promoted on the web sites of wholesale nurseries that produce them. Places like Bailey nursery in MN, Lake County nursery in Perry, OH, and Monrovia nursery in CA. Of these three Lake County is by far the most heavy with new trees. Last time I looked they had added several to their Our Introductions part of the site that weren't there the last time. |
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| Thanks for the website recommendations, and at least one of the books I ordered was good! |
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- Posted by strobiculate none (My Page) on Tue, Apr 10, 12 at 15:54
| What you are looking for doesn't really exist, at least not in the form you specify. However, if you visit the trade shows, they are heavily laden with the new intros, award winners, etc. Pick a state, and google (state) nursery and landscape association. bboy, please, if you are going to throw information out, provide some basis for comparison. Monrovia doesn't play well with others. They cover their intros with the same patents/trademarks/copyrights everyone does these days, but then they hold those rights close. Farther, if are not currently a customer of Monrovia, odds, are, you aren't going to be, because of how they choose to service their customers. Lake County has chosen the philosophy of patenting anything that holds still long enough. Get a flat tire outside one of their growing fields? You just might get a patent slapped on. Evidently, they feel the cost of slapping paper on everything is justified by the (relatively) few that become popular. What about J. Frank Schmidt? As for books, I hardly ever read Jacobson. Of course, I don;t live in the Pacific Northwest, where Jacobson enjoys favored son status. And if your book don't sell well enough to stay in print...all of the creative spin you may choose to embellish just ain't gonna change the fact no one wants to read it. |
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| Jacobson was approached by the publisher but was not interested in giving it another go. Meanwhile, used book dealers ask something like three times the original price. Various other comments in your post are off base as well. |
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- Posted by formandfoliage 9b (Sunset zone 15) (My Page) on Wed, Apr 11, 12 at 9:42
| Another thing that you can do is subscribe to 'American Nurseryman'. It is a trade publication and full of stuff that the average homeowner/gardener/tree lover doesn't care about, but it does have articles about new introductions. It is also useful to get some perspective about the trade's cultural practices, some of which are instructive and some appalling. I just like to know what the industry is up to... |
Here is a link that might be useful: Form and Foliage
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| Keep in mind your area is pretty unique in that you can grow more tropical than some but also your not all that far from the Chihuahuan to the west. There are some books you can read online that are certainly worth looking at. Check out http://issuu.com/richtrav Plants for Subtropical Texas, Mexico 1 and Mexico 2. |
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- Posted by gardengal48 PNW zone 8 (My Page) on Wed, Apr 11, 12 at 20:05
| I'm looking for a book that lists foreign trees and discusses their potential for use in the US. This statement is somewhat perplexing :-) With limited exceptions, aren't most "foreign" trees already familiar in the US? Sure, there may be some new introductions of cultivars or hybrids not yet widely available commercially here but it's not like they are out there inventing new species! A relatively unknown or rare species may from time to time appear on the horizon - Hinkley and Monrovia are good for that - but these must be the exceptions. Other than grower nursery catalogs/websites and trade mags, I can't think of any published material that is current enough to keep up with the "new intros". By the time the books get written and published the plant is no longer "new". |
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| I forgot about this one. I have a copy myself, it is a pretty high quality production. |
Here is a link that might be useful: New Trees: Recent Introductions to Cultivation [Hardcover]
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- Posted by georgeinbandonoregon z9 OR (My Page) on Thu, Apr 12, 12 at 0:45
| john grimshaws book "new trees" that bboy mentioned is indeed a good (though very expensive) resource with good pictures and text covering a variety of trees (especially mexican pines and oaks) that might work where you are. the other resource is the online nurseries like camellia forest, woodlanders, cistus nursery, colvos creek, and yuccado that have good selectons of the new and rare non natives (and natives). |
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- Posted by dutchess12545 Z5b NY (My Page) on Thu, Apr 12, 12 at 3:18
| Plants That Merit Attention: VOLUME I: TREES (Plants That Merit Attention) [Bargain Price] [Hardcover] Horticultural Committee of the Garden Club of America (Author), Janet Meakin Poor (Author), Nancy Peterson Brewster (Author) available new or used on AMAZON |
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| Thanks everyone for the responses and suggestions. I suppose I should have elaborated a bit more. The book that seemed highly recommended on many of my searches, Dirr's manual, was either lacking entries or sufficient data on several trees that I have personally planted (stone pine, mexican white oak, Q. canbyi, Q. polymorhpa, etc). Some of the info. simply wasn't relevant as well, example being the montezuma cypress. Its great for my area, but he seems to dismiss it. By 'new' trees I meant trees new to the US market, or trees that aren't typically included in a landscape here. A very kind gentleman from this board recently sent me several oak seedlings, glabrescens/ilex/afares/trojana, and on my own I've found a few more oddities. I've found a little info online, but I was just wondering if perhaps I was overlooking a book that might provide a little insight into these 'new' species. I have found some information on British and Aussie sites, but I really wanted something more comparable to my climate. SFA's mast research institute has some great insight on some of the mexican oaks, but I simply wanted more! I've ordered just about every book named here so far, and I've started picking through the websites, so hopefully my curiousity will be quenched. I'll have to wait a week or two until I order the grimshaw book...my wife's patience with my tree oriented expenses is wearing thin! |
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- Posted by georgeinbandonoregon z9 OR (My Page) on Thu, Apr 12, 12 at 11:10
| as previously mentioned, the book "new trees" is chocked full of info on mexican oaks and rare oaks from all over. bean's "trees and shrubs hardy in the british isles" covers a huge number of oaks including ilex and trojana. these 2 oaks MAY have problems in the s.e. because they are native to and generally require a mediterranean climate of wet winters and dry summers and may have real problems with hot wet deep south and gulf coast summers. oaks from s.e. asia like acuta, myrsinifolia, etc. might be a better fit for relatively wet summer areas). another good source for oak info is the interantional oak society and their discussion forum on yahoo groups (you have to sign up for the board but its free) for "quercus". finally, i may have oak seedlings (and acorns this fall) of species that you might be interested in---folks on the quercus board are also great sources of oak plants and seeds as well as info. hope this helps. |
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| I just signed up for the discussion group, looks interesting! I suppose I'll find out about ilex and trojana, they're in the ground and protected from the chickens and cattle. |
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- Posted by georgeinbandonoregon z9 OR (My Page) on Thu, Apr 12, 12 at 17:10
| FWIW, the mexican oaks seem quite adaptable---growing well in relatively mild winters areas in texas AND oregon. for example, i have good size trees (some 30' tall) of q. reticulata/rugosa, sartorii, rhyzophylla, greggii, obtusata, hypoleucoides, mexicana,laceyi, viminea,durifolia,glabrescens, etc. growing on the southern oregon coast. |
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| The San Antonio Botanical garden has a Q. ilex near it's gardens of the bible section. Seems to be doing fine but it's been many years since I've been there. Your not in the southeast either. Nothing like Georgia or Alabama. Most of the asian oaks require acidic soil. Most of the San Antonio area has alkaline soils. |
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| I've only been to the botanical gardens once...I plan on going back within the next month or so. We're quite dry here most of the time...this past year more so than normal. I can't wait to see how some of these different trees do. Frankly, I'm more concerned about the threat of pocket gophers to my trees than any environmental hazards. |
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| What is your soil like? Do you have any idea what would repel the gophers? Most of DFW has alkaline clay so we don't have the gophers. |
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- Posted by formandfoliage 9b (Sunset zone 15) (My Page) on Thu, Apr 12, 12 at 18:14
| Cinch traps do a great job on gophers - we've taken out every one of them. Warning, though (at least here) - the moles come in after the gophers are vanquished and they are more territorial than the gophers and keep the gophers out. They are hunting grubs, etc, not plant roots, but they are incredibly disruptive and often cause me more grief than the gophers, since they create hollows under the plants and allow the root balls to dry out or the plants to heave (obviously a much bigger issue with younger plants than established ones). Moles are much harder to trap since most of the obvious activity is in areas that they do not revisit. It's never easy... |
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- Posted by georgeinbandonoregon z9 OR (My Page) on Thu, Apr 12, 12 at 18:28
| was basing the asian oaks suggestion in part on the recommendations of "the southern living garden book" an apparently widely used but probably NOT infallable guide for the general area. OTOH, q. laceyi from limestone regions of texas i believe does just fine here on very acid soils as do a number of mexican oaks from potentially limestone derived soil in their native habitat. my experience is that many oak (and other species) may be suprisingly tolerant of different soil chemistry and they also may be tolerant of differing heat and/or moisture regimes (or they may not) with proper siting/microclimate (let alone providing protection against various types of varmint predation) AND a certain amt. of just plain luck. however, guy sternberg (who posts on the oak forum) in his "native trees for north american landscapes" seem to indicate that his experience was that dry summer oak species had difficulties dealing with wet summer climate---but how this may or may not apply to san antonio conditions i don't know and only you can find out for sure. good luck!!!! |
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| I have a couple of different veins of soil running across my property, but primarily sandy to sandy loam. I have trapped 20+ gophers on the 1 acre that I'm primarily planting on now, and I'm not sure I'm keeping up. I'm surrounded by pasture land that is full of gophers, so they fill the void left by my trapping relatively quickly. I mainly just try to defend trees, but I've planted dozens this year, it takes quite a bit of effort. I've tried several different traps, and just received my first set of cinch traps. I've caught most so far using Victor snap traps. Can't do poison out of fear of killing my chickens, plus a general dislike of poison in general. I think if I can get the trees through their first couple of years they'll be ok, until then, war on the gophers! |
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| If you see Bill Murray out there, you know you've got a problem. |
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- Posted by formandfoliage 9b (Sunset zone 15) (My Page) on Fri, Apr 13, 12 at 11:07
| I invoke Bill Murray all the time! We are bordered by pasture on two sides, too, which is why I think every now and again a rogue gopher gets back in, but the moles seem to be what keeps them out (and I have had this confirmed by County Agent et al). I think that you'll like the cinch traps - we have never had to set them more than once or twice vs the other types. Gophers - and moles - also seem to gravitate to disturbed soil so that once your activity tapers off, that may help, too. Every time I get annoyed at the moles I count my blessings that I do not have deer, although the jack rabbits around here are so big that sometimes you could mistake them for deer. We should all be glad that we don't have what another person posted about: moose! |
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