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Unwelcome news

Ursula Buchan

Wednesday, 21st May 2008

Ursula Buchan spends some time in the Garden

In 1811, Jane Austen wrote to her sister, Cassandra, in response, no doubt, to an anxious enquiry: ‘I will not say that your mulberry trees are dead, but I am afraid they are not alive.’ I know something of how the Blessed Jane felt, for my advice about the health and welfare of mulberry trees is also sometimes sought at this time of year.

The reason is simple. The black mulberry (Morus nigra) is one of the last trees to come into leaf in spring. While horse chestnut, sycamore and hazel have fully expanded their leaves, the mulberry is still in tight, discouraging bud. This year, in late April, I looked across my garden at the heavenly apple blossom (surely this is the best season for several years?) while the mulberry was resolutely twiggy and bare. No wonder Cassandra Austen was in a panic.

Nor is the mulberry the only one to take things at a leisurely pace. The Indian bean tree, Catalpa bignonioides (much loved by gardeners in the suburbs), which has very large, heart-shaped leaves, foxglove flowers and long, stringy bean seedpods, is even slower to green up. Nor should you expect anything until mid-May from Acer griseum, the Chinese Paperbark Maple, either. The Judas tree, Cercis siliquastrum, usually starts to produce its purple-pink pea flowers before the leaves unfold in late spring, and is the better for it but, curiously, flowers and leaves have come together this year. In the case of shrubs, hibiscus always looks completely dead until at least the middle of this month, while Edgeworthia chrysantha and Magnolia wilsonii are also liable to fray my nerves.

Although this may seem worrying to us, for the tree or shrub there is a distinct advantage in leafing late, especially if those leaves are large. That way they are likely to escape damage from late spring frosts. Many a hydrangea could learn something from the festina lente approach of the mulberry. What is interesting, however, is that the mulberry is also one of the first trees to colour in autumn, and to lose its leaves in the annual fall. The effort of producing prodigal quantities of fruit must exhaust it.

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