Trees for pots - Oregon Association of Nurseries

Trees for
These selections work well when
planted in containers in the yard
This small side patio at the home of Barbara
Jennings and Dick Teutsch is able to accommodate
a potted purple smoke tree (center) along with
the potted shrubs and flowers. The garden in a
nice, older part of Portland, Ore. was designed by
Rick Hansen of Pacific Garden and Waterworks.
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pots
curt kipp
By Marty Wingate
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New gardeners fall in love with
flowers, but after only a few seasons,
the realization dawns that something
more — something lasting — is needed.
It isn’t long before they go in search of
those longer-lived pieces of the garden.
But when it comes to trees, they
hesitate. There doesn’t seem to be
enough room.
The very word, “tree,” conjures up
grandeur — savannahs, forests, parks,
arboretums, and estates dotted with
towering and spreading canopies. Trees
are not the first thing that comes to a
gardener’s mind when filling an ornamental pot.
But given the right choice, the right
container, and the right placement, a
potted ornamental garden that includes
trees is not only entirely within reason,
but also advantageous. It’s not every
tree that can be moved from that corner
of the garden to another so easily.
Karen Schwartz, owner of
Calendula Garden Design, calls them
“trees in transition.” Plants that may
grow into park-sized specimens can be
grown in a pot for several years with
accommodation and planning.
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Picks
from the
Pros
It isn’t hard to get growers to talk about plants. The tough part is getting them to narrow down
their list of favorites to just a handful. Here are some of the varieties our sources recommended:
Neil Buley
Joel Johnson
Japanese clethra
(Clethra barbinervis)
— Usually grown as a
large multi-stemmed
shrub, we train it as a
small, single-trunk tree.
Cascading clusters of
creamy-white, mid to latesummer blooms grow above the green, strongly
veined, serrated leaves. They have a subtle, spicysweet fragrance, and last late into the fall. These
long (4-6 inches) chains of small, bell-shaped
flowers look like sourwood flowers and are quite
showy, especially when the leaves turn to red
and bronze-orange in autumn. It responds well
to pruning, but will grow to 10-12 feet with a
rounded canopy if left alone. Hardy through Zone
5, they do well in partial shade to full sun if given
adequate moisture.
Blue Spanish fir (Abies
pinsapo 'Glauca') — This
slow-growing evergreen
has stiff blue-green,
succulent needles. It’s
excellent for large or
small containers. It grows
15 feet tall in 10 years,
maturing to 60 feet tall by 30 feet wide.
Treephoria
Boring, Ore.
Eshraghi Nursery
Hillsboro, Ore.
Carolina allspice
(Calycanthus floridus)
— This small tree has
shiny green leaves that
are fragrant and aromatic
when crushed. The
flowers are very unusual
and kind of manly — they
are brown and have a sweet and spicy scent.
They last most of the summer. As yellow fall color
begins to develop, the flowers mature into large,
unusual-looking, dark brown seed capsules that
persist through the winter. Grows to 9-12 feet.
at maturity and adapts well to being grown in
a container. It can also be easily kept to smaller
size by careful pruning. Training these to branch
at two or three feet raises up the flowers and
foliage. Zone 4.
Arnold Promise witch
hazel (Hamamelis ×
intermedia ‘Arnold
Promise’) — Witch
hazels are proven
container plants, and
this is our favorite for
training into a small tree.
Its upright habit, dominant central leader and
compact branch habit makes it pretty easy to
train up. Its symmetrical growth isn’t leggy like
some of the cultivars we’ve tried. It’s a great
tree for year-round interest. Corrugated, deep
green leaves turn to bright golden yellow with
orange highlights in the fall. Flowering begins
in late January. Matures to 10-15 feet in a large
container. It’s large enough to cast some shade,
but well mannered enough to live on a patio or
in a courtyard. Zone 5.
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Acer palmatum 'Oregon
Sunset' — Large leaves
round out the overall
shape of this compact
grower. Purple-red leaves
begin as a soft red. In
fall, the leaves turn an
outstanding orange-red.
This is a favorite for year round interest. Reaches
7–8 feet tall in 10 years.
Picea pungens 'Glauca
Slenderina Pendula'™
— This spruce is exclusive
to Eshraghi Nursery. It
is a weeping form of
Colorado blue spruce,
which is more narrow and
blue that other cultivars.
Reaches 7–8 feet tall in 10 years.
Carl Munn
Munn’s Nursery
Salem, Ore.
Acer palmatum
‘Mikawa Yatsubusa’
— This compact, multibranched small plant
comes out with light,
yellow-green, overlapping
spring foliage bunched up
at the tip shoots. It turns
medium green in later spring with brilliant red
samaras. Fall colors of yellow to deep red. This is
a very suitable tree for bonsai culture. Zone 5.
‘Moonrise’® full
moon maple (Acer
shirasawanum ‘Munn
001’ PP16718) — This
upright, multi-branched
tree, with a moderate to
vigorous growth habit,
forms a rounded toped
tree of 12–18 feet. It has leaves of carmine
red new growth in the spring with lime green
midveins turning to gold in summer. The color
is lime green if you grow it in the shade. In
later summer, new growth appears as Carmine
red spikes over gold and lime green foliage.
‘Moonrise’ can be grown in full sun, with only
light amounts of burning on top leaves. This
plant has survived winters at –26 F.
A.p. ‘Twombly’s Red
Sentinel’ — This upright,
vase-shaped tree reaches
12 feet tall, with small red
leaves that are somewhat
glossy in appearance. The
leaves are a lighter red in
the spring, turning dark
red later in the season. It holds its color very well
in summer and is a great plant for foundations
and screening effects on patios. Zone 5b.
Karen Schwartz
Calendula Garden Design
Portland, Ore.
Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica
'Jindai') — This evergreen has interesting
foliage. Its slow growing, dense compact form
contrasts well with lighter textured plants. It
reaches 6 feet tall in 10 yars with a wide, slowgrowing habit and light green color. Zone 6.
Japanese umbrella pine
(Sciadopitys verticillata
'Joe Kozey') — This
evergreen has an unusual
look, with amazing
needles that are very thick
and dark green. With
its upright narrow form,
it tolerates the small
growing space of a container environment very
well. Reaches 8 feet tall in 10 years. Dark green
color. Zone 5.
Boxleaf azara (Azara
microphylla) — This
evergreen has foliage
with a light, airy texture.
Its graceful upright shape
and slow growth won’t
overwhelm a container. Its
flowers are very fragrant.
Reaches 8 feet tall in 10 years. Dark green,
glossy foliage. Zone 8.
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Trees for pots
Why buy
from us?
Great Plant Picks
Acer palmatum dissectum ‘Viridis’ is an ideal Japanese maple for containers. It dazzles with its lacy leaf
shape and stunning colors.
As in the garden, the size and
shape of a potted tree matters — no
one wants to be slapped in the face
with a wet juniper branch on a winter’s morning. Schwartz prefers selections that are not branched too low:
“One tree in a pot is boring to me,”
she says, “unless it’s a specimen chosen for its form.”
At the base of her trees, she
includes perennials and evergreen
ground covers, and, in summer, annuals
are a possibility.
Unless you garden at Versailles
and in those stone pots big enough
to sleep in, it’s unlikely you will be
choosing a straight species of a tree
and let it grow to its natural size.
Gardeners desire the atmosphere of a
tree — its stature and permanence —
but need to find those same fine characteristics in a plant that fits.
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4194-71st Ave. SE,
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Deciduous choices
The hallmarks of deciduous trees
may include spring bloom and fall
color, but their winter presence adds
structure and form to the garden, and
the shadows thrown by the low winter
sun on their branches is a decoration in
themselves. When grown in containers,
trees can be sited to make the most of
all their best characteristics.
Ginkgos (Ginkgo biloba) take top
marks for a city tree — they are tolerant
of pollution and a variety of soil types.
But ginkgos, up to 70 feet high and 40
feet wide, do not easily fit into container culture.
Enter the dwarf ginkgos. Their
size suits a pot — most grow to about
5 feet — and their mounding form
looks good on display. Their fanlike
foliage — cupped leaves on ‘Chase
Manhattan’ and clusters of foliage on
‘Jade Butterflies’ — attracts Schwartz.
The many and varied Japanese
maples (Acer palmatum) take the cake
in containers. The smaller cultivars —
often with rounded or spreading forms
Our unique selection of
tree, shrub and native
liners will keep your
clients interested.
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Trees for pots
Doreen L. Wynja for monrovia
The bay tree (Laurus nobiilis) makes a nice
selection for potting, with its compact form and
attractive growth habit.
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— make quite a spectacle in a pot,
where they can be admired closer to
eye level.
David Eshraghi of Eshraghi Nursery
in Hillsboro, prefers the compact dwarf
selections for pots, such as ‘Coonara
Pygmy’, which creates a softly-textured
mound with its deeply lobed leaves.
Carl Munn, owner of Munn’s
Nursery in Brooks, agrees that Japanese
maples seem to be made for containers. He likes the fullmoon maple (Acer
shirasawanum), both the chartreuseleaved ‘Aureum’ and ‘Munn 001’
(Moonrise), which comes from his own
nursery and flushes out with red foliage
before turning lime-green.
Munn also mentions the floating clouds maple (A. palmatum
‘Ukigumo’) with white and pink
variegation; ‘Viridis’, one of the dissectum group; and the more upright
‘Twombly Red Sentinel’.
Shrubs as trees
At Treephoria in Boring, manager
Neil Buley turns shrubs into trees, a
technique he learned from a worker at
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Trees for pots
Doreen L. Wynja
This Profusion beautyberry (Callicarpa bodinieri 'Profusion') fits well in a container and offers stunning
winter interest with its tiny, shiny neon purple berries.
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Kinen’s Big & Phat Special Plants. “It’s
the Norbert Kinen model,” Buley says.
Some shrubs lend themselves to the
style, while for others, such as the popular beautyberry, Callicarpa bodinieri
var. giraldii ‘Profusion’, it’s an “ongoing
experiment.” (Norbert Kinen passsed
away in 2011; Kinen’s is now being run
by Norbert’s son, Anthony.)
The Japanese clethra (Clethra barbinervis) makes a fine treelike specimen, and works well when it’s “lifted.”
It can grow from 10 to 20 feet high,
and so when the height of the pot
is added in, this shrub does indeed
become a small tree, showing off with
fragrant, pendant racemes of white
flowers in summer.
Witch hazels (Hamamelis) grow
into a successful tree form, too, Buley
says. Their wide-spreading form creates
Trees in pots — selections
by shape
a sense of size, and the (often) scented
winter flowers make them a good
choice for small gardens where plants
cannot look good only in summer, but
must do double or triple duty.
It is classified as a shrub, but at
an ultimate size of 15 feet high and
wide, many gardeners with small
spaces would say that Arbutus unedo
‘Compacta’ is most certainly treelike.
It’s one of Schwartz’s favorites in a
container, because of its evergreen foliage, cinnamon bark, and autumn flowers and fruit.
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Trees can be selected for where
they will fit — just how narrow
is the entryway? — as well as
chosen for the effect they will
have when potted.
Spreading, rounded — Acer
griseum; Acer palmatum
‘Coonara Pygmy’, ‘Mikawa Yatsubusa’; Hamamelis; Magnolia
grandiflora ‘Little Gem’
Upright — Fagus sylvatica ‘Red
Obelisk’; Taxus × media ‘Hicksii’; Cephalotaxus harringtonia ‘Fastigiata’; Cryptomeria
japonica ‘Jinfsi’
Narrow — Juniperus communis
‘Gold Cone’ and ‘Brynhyfryd
Gold’; Taxus × media ‘Beanpole’; Taxus baccata ‘Standishii’
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Evergreens
Smaller cultivars of conifers top the
list for Schwartz, who appreciates the
plants’ year-round interest; the broad
selection means that there’s a conifer
for almost any potted garden situation
and style. She uses the upright Japanese
plum yew (Cephalotaxus harringtonia ‘Fastigiata’) in a shady entry and
Chamaecyparis lawsoniana ‘Wissel’s
Saguaro’ for its unusual shapes — complete with saguaro cactus “arms.” The
thick needles on the Japanese umbrella
pine (Sciadopitys verticillata) add visual
texture to a garden, and when the narrow cultivar ‘Joe Kozey’ is used, that
effect can be used on a deck as well as
at the front door.
Broadleaf evergreens, too, can be
found for containers, including the
diminutive ‘Little Gem’, a 15-foot version of the huge and stately Southern
magnolia (Magnolia grandiflora) —
Schwartz notes that they take abuse
well. For the edible ornamental garden
in pots, the bay laurel (Laurus nobilis)
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Maintaining the show
The welfare of the container garden is almost totally dependent on
the gardener, and so some caution
and advice should be passed along to
the customer.
Don’t use garden soil in a pot.
It seems a given to those in the
know, but it’s worth pointing out that
bagged “potting medium” is better in
a container, although it contains no
soil. Schwartz adds a mulch.
Without benefit of soil with all its
natural nutrients, trees in pots need
regular fertilizer — just not too much.
Over-fertilizing causes excessive
growth, which in turn causes repotting, root pruning and starting over.
Containers dry out quicker than
the ground, and gardeners can be
forgetful in summer, when too many
other things vie for their attention.
Eshraghi suggests a drip irrigation
system, which can carry pots through
dry seasons and vacations.
On the other hand, containers can be overwatered. “They are
trapped!” Schwartz says of the root
systems, and during the wet months
adequate drainage should be provided. A flat pot sitting on a flat concrete patio may turn the soil mix into
a quagmire.
Root pruning can help slow a
tree’s growth and therefore extend its
potted life.
Potting up — choosing a pot of
a larger size works, too, but it’s only
a matter of time before even a larger
pot won’t work. Some gardeners like
to donate oversized plants to local
public gardens.
Marty Wingate, based in Seattle, writes
and speaks about plants, gardens, and
travel. Her latest book, Landscaping
for Privacy, recently was published by
Timber Press. She can be reached at
[email protected].
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