AUTUMN COLOUR - IT BEGINS!!

Hello - the beauty of AUTUMN COLOUR - how we love it!! There has been a subtle change at the nursery over the last week - with the cooler nights - and nippy mornings - plus the shortening days - this triggers a change in our plants - and they begin to withdraw some of the chemicals and hormones back into their trunks and branches - causing a breakdown of the green leaf into wonderful pigments of red and orange - giving us A FABULOUS SHOW.

Many of the ACERS - members of the MAPLE family are starting to colour up - as the photo at the top shows -

It is still early - and over the next month - every day - new tints and colours are revealed - in many ways it is the HARVEST period of the nursery - the farmers have their golden fields of corn - and here at CROWN NURSERY - we have our AUTUMN COLOUR and the ripening APPLES - or perhaps I am just an old romantic at heart!!

People often ask which is the best plant for autumn colour - but it really depends on what effect you are trying to achieve - and also your soil. Those on drier sandy soil - slightly on the acidic side will get far more of the orange and red tints than those on wetter clay soil - whose autumn colour tends to be far more towards the yellow side of the spectrum.

However - the creme de la creme if you have a neutral to acid soil has to be LIQUIDAMBAR - The Sweet Gum. As the photo below shows - a STUNNER!! It also has a very ornamental bark too!! This tree - unlike most - starts it's autumn colour on one lower branch and the effect then floods over the rest of the tree - giving a much longer period of colour.

The photo just above that is of AMELANCHIER - but grown on sandy soil - on a heavy clay -it will have yellow autumn colour.

Colour also seems to vary from plant to plant - and in some trees - there will always be stronger autumn colour on some types than others, for the best autumn colour on trees - FRAXINUS 'RAYWOOD' (Claret Ash), QUERCUS RUBRA (Red Oak), PYRUS COMMUNIS (Wild Pear) and even our dear common little SPINDLE - EUONYMUS EUROPAEUS - with it's stange fruit shown below - will oblige in most years.

It's an exciting time - early autumn - and certainly not a time to shut up shop in your garden and prepare for winter - there is much colour to come - from berries to bark - from foliage to fruits - come and see for yourself!!

UNTIL NEXT TIME,

RICHARD