Episode 157: Flowering trees for every season  


Due to their size and expense, gardeners tend to put a lot more thought into the trees they ultimately buy for their landscape. While a perennial might only live for 6 or 7 years, a tree might grace your garden for 50 years or more—outliving the person who so carefully selected it, in fact. Here at Fine Gardening, we feel strongly that trees should look good in more than one season (for all of the reasons above AND because they take up a lot of real estate). Therefore, on today’s episode, we may be highlighting our favorite flowering trees for every season, but these choices have more going for them than just some fleeting blooms. Listen to hear about which trees we’re willing to sacrifice a chunk of our paycheck on and why.   

Amanda Bennett is vice president of horticulture and collections at Atlanta Botanical Gardens in Georgia. 

Danielle’s Plants 

Spring: ‘Don Egolf’ Chinese redbud (Cercis chinensis ‘Don Egolf’, Zones 5b-9)  

Spring: ‘Don Egolf’ Chinese redbud

Summer: ‘Milk and Honey’ Japanese stewartia (Stewartia pseudocamellia ‘Milk and Honey’, Zones 5-7) 

 ‘Milk and Honey’ Japanese stewartia
Summer: ‘Milk and Honey’ Japanese stewartia with pollinators aplenty

Fall color on stewartia

Autumn: Red Balloon® viburnum (Viburnum x rhytidophylloides ‘Redell’, Zones 4-8) 

Red Balloon® viburnum
Autumn: Red Balloon® viburnum

Winter:  ‘Pink Perfection’ camellia (Camellia japonica ‘Pink Perfection’, Zones 7-10) 

'Pink Perfection' camellia
Winter: ‘Pink Perfection’ camellia

Carol’s Plants  

Spring: ‘Wada’s Memory’ magnolia (Magnolia x kewensis ‘Wada’s Memory’, Zones 5-8) 

'Wada's Memory' magnolia
Spring: ‘Wada’s Memory’ magnolia, recently featured in a Mid-Atlantic regional report:

Summer: Sourwood (Oxydendrum arboreum, Zones 5-9) 

Sourwood
Summer: Sourwood habit, photo: Courtesy of Famartin via Wikimedia

Sourwood, flower
Sourwood, flower, photo: Courtesy of Kwaśnodrzew Amerykańsk via Wikimedia

Autumn: Seven-son flower (Heptacodium miconioides, Zones 5-9) 

Seven-son flower,
Autumn: Seven-son flower, habit

Seven-son flower
Seven-son flower, flower

Winter: ‘Sweet Sunshine’ witch hazel (Hamamelis x intermedia ‘Sweet Sunshine’) 

‘Sweet Sunshine’ witch hazel
Winter: ‘Sweet Sunshine’ witch hazel, with Adam Wheeler for scale

 

Expert’s Plants  

Winter:  Yunnan magnolia (Magnolia laevifolia syn. M. yunanensis, Zones 8b-11) 

Yunnan magnolia
Winter:  Yunnan magnolia, photo: Courtesy of Ideachick via Wikimedia Commons

Spring: Two-winged silverbell  (Halesia diptera, Zones 6-9)

Two-winged silverbell
Two-winged silverbell, photo: Courtesy of Daderot via Wikimedia Commons

Summer:  Japanese stewartia (Stewartia pseudocamellia, Zones 5-8) 

Japanese stewartia
Summer: Japanese stewartia

Fall: Common witch hazel (Hamamelis virginiana, Zones 3-9) 

Common witch hazel
Fall: Common witch hazel, photo: Courtesy of Doug McGrady via Wikimedia Commons

 

 


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