Trees and shrubs in parks and gardens 2015

[Maritfri]

As always, Hamamelis mollis Pallida in bloom in January





Beautiful and lovely this year as well

Marit

[Gunilla]

I love the Hamamelis all covered with tiny yellow ribbons in the middle of the winter. Lovely photos, Marit.

[YT]

Prunus mume has just started to bloom here

[Maritfri]

Hi,

Lovely Prunus Mume blossom!



Here blooms Hamamelis x intermedia Diane now.



The flowers are very beautiful with snow on?!



Marit

[Maggi Young]

I am really bad at identifying trees - always have been - but I've just read this, with these great links- and I think it may be a help to quite a few of us!

 Shared from Arboricoltura Urbana-Arboriculture and Urban Forestry di Francesco Ferrini
Science Website

"Photos of real winter twigs to help you identify trees in winter. Winter is a great time to identify trees. The forest is open, there are no insects, and instead of a blur of vegetation, many trees stand out strongly and have a characteristic winter look. Some are evergreen, some have old pods, old leaves, leftover fruit, spines or giant buds - and a tree's silhouette is far more visible without the cloak of leaves.
Twigs and buds are another distinctive features of many species. "
Check these two websites
http://forestry.about.com/od/treeidentification/a/winter_tree_id.htm

http://www.naturedetectives.org.uk/NR/rdonlyres/344CA3AC-3973-465F-9E30-828247B9770D/0/twigs.pdf

[Rick R.]

Sometimes trees can  be easier to identify in the winter than in the summer, if you know the characteristics to look for.
As a kid, these (below) were the first identification books I owned.  They were really easy to use and were my first introductions to the dichotomous key. (And they were cheap, too!)
   There is a whole bunch of these with titles like: Berry Finder, Winter Weed Finder, Fern Finder, (Animal)Track Finder,etc.  They are great gifts for young horticulturalists or budding naturalists.

[ArnoldT]

For those with a digital lean there is always:

http://leafsnap.com/

[David Nicholson]

I was prompted by an article on Yellow Magnolias in the current edition of The Plantsman to re-visit some pictures of them from Lanhydrock in April 2011 and thought I would share them again here. We've never been able to get to Landhdrock whilst they were flowering since then.

[David Nicholson]

.... and the last of the yellow Magnolia pictures

[Maggi Young]

Ian has been watering the bonsai

[François Lambert]

A nice large black elder behind the barn, growing in a 'wild' spot where we let nature do it's own gardening.  The black elder is really flowering massively this year.  We harvested umbells from this one to make our stock of elder lemonade

[Maggi Young]

François, I cannot remember when I last saw an Elder flower so well 

[François Lambert]

François, I cannot remember when I last saw an Elder flower so well 

This one is our 'champion'

[johnw]

François   - Sir Peter Smithers was very keen on Sambucus canadensis 'Maxima'.  If you can grow them so spectacularly you should try that one.

johnw

[johnralphcarpenter]

Lots of flowering shrubs performing at present:

Buddleja globosa 'Cally Orange'

Buddleja colvilei - should have photographed this earlier, the flowers are going over.

Syringa komarowii