From Good Friday, every Friday, Sunday and Bank Holiday until the end of August and every Friday in September from 12noon to 5pm Wollerton, Market Drayton TF9 3NA Tel: 01630 685760 www.wollertonoldhallgarden.com
More New Large-Flowered Hybrids, Yes or No?………....….Ton Hannink
Germination to First Flowers for First Time Raisers…....Brian Collingwood
Old Friends, Where Are You Now?.………….….......…Dr Kalani Seymour
Watching them Grow: Seedling Forms in Clematis…….…….....Daniel Falck
Section 4: Cultivars, Species, Groups
Section 6:
Memoriam
S SE ECCTTIIOON N 1 1 –– Y YO OU
UR R S SO OCCIIEETTY Y
From Your Editor, Brian Collingwood
Welcome to The Clematis 2014 Once again, my thanks to everyone, at home or from overseas, who has contributed to this Edition of our Society’s annual Journal, The Clematis. I would like to say a big thanks to all authors, especially the new ones, once again; every single script is greatly appreciated. Also, thanks to those who have generously contributed images – good pictures are vital for The Clematis.
To new Members reading these lines, the BCS extends a warm welcome into our Society. We hope you derive great pleasure from your membership, for many years to come! And if you wish to introduce some friends, they are welcome, too!
This year’s Journal summarises the affairs of the Society over the year, followed by a wide selection of articles from home and abroad, touching on many aspects of Clematis.
The BCS Facebook page, launched around a year ago, has attracted several new members into the Society. This is a small project to try to build a little more awareness of the Society, on the internet. We are looking for an individual who would be interested in taking this on, and maintaining/developing the page. It’s not an onerous task at all; rather, it just needs limited but steady attention – occasional postings – to keep it appealing for people who browse. One (or two) interested persons could make a big contribution to the BCS. If this appeals to you, please let me know by either ‘phone or email and I can provide details. You don’t need to have any particular computer skills at all, just the desire to project a good image of our Society to the general internet user.
My Notes would not be complete without referring to the sad loss of my friend, Bernard Allen, on 29th March. Bernard was a great person to know; always cheerful and friendly, always helpful and interested. He wrote several articles for the Journal and helped me out on countless occasions with images from his personal collection. He converted many photographic slides into digital images for me – you could tell from the quality of the finished files that he had always put a lot of effort into it. He was a very intelligent and creative person who gave of his time freely, and the BCS benefitted greatly from this, over many years. I know everyone will miss him a great deal and we send Rosemarie and her family our sincere condolences and heartfelt best wishes.
I hope you enjoy reading this year’s Edition of The Clematis as much as I have enjoyed compiling it. It only remains for me to wish all readers and their loved ones health, happiness and the very best of good fortune for the remainder of 2014, and beyond.
Brian Collingwood
Articles for TheClematis2015:please send to B. Collingwood, by post or email: bcollingwood@ntlworld.com. Hand-written submissions are most welcome. 600 words are suitable for a shorter article. If submitting technical articles, please include explanation that will aid the lay reader.
COPYRIGHT OWNERSHIP OF THE CONTENT OF THIS PUBLICATION RESIDES WITH THE RESPECTIVE AUTHOR OR AUTHORS. THE REPRODUCTION OF ANY PART IS FORBIDDEN WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION PLEASE CONTACT THE EDITOR FOR FURTHER INFORMATION
Join Us
The British Clematis Society
Journal, Newsletters, Advisory Service, Seed Exchange, Lectures, Slide Shows, Pruning Demonstrations, Display Gardens, Lists of Clematis Nurseries and Open Gardens, Plant Sales, Tours
Membership runs from January 1st to December 31st each year
Single Membership Family Membership
Personal membership 2 persons at same address
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Application to join should be made to:
The Membership Secretary, Linda Crowther 11, Norton Mandeville, Ingatestone, Essex CM4 0LN. Tel 01277 822883 email: ljc.1@btinternet.com
Cheques payable to ‘The British Clematis Society’ Overseas payments by Eurocheque, Bank Draft, International Money Order (in Sterling), Internet (Paypal)
Or simply use your credit card at our Website http://www.britishclematis.org
In addition to leading the committee, Charne is also liaison and advertising co-ordinator for the BCS Journal. Holds a stock of back copies of the journal.
Member of the Panel of Proof Readers: Victoria Matthews 13, Chatsworth Close, Market Deeping, Peterborough PE6 8AZ Telephone: 01778 380256 email rhsclemreg@aol.com
Newsletter Distribution: Sue Reade 123, Andover Avenue, Middleton, Manchester M24 1JQ Telephone: 0161 643 2985 email sue.reade@uwclub.net or readesue@gmail.com
Regional Groups
Northern Group: Leader: Sue Reade 123, Andover Avenue, Middleton, Manchester M24 1JQ Telephone: 0161 643 2985 email sue.reade@uwclub.net or readesue@gmail.com
Midland Group: Leader, Josie Hulbert
‘Trentham’, 56 Haden Park Road, Cradley Heath, West Midlands B64 7HE Telephone 07939 664185 email Jjhulbert1@aol.com
BCS Website & Internet Help Desk enquiries: Steve Christmas 6, Hawthorne Close, Grateley, Hampshire SP11 8JL Telephone 01264 889735 email steve@christmas.freeserve.co.uk
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Panel of proof readers: Victoria Matthews, Mike Brown, Roy Nunn, Brian Cromie, Glenis Dyer, Simon Nicoll, Val Le May Neville-Parry. Contact details from Hon. Secretary
Sales Table: Sylvia Currie ‘Little John’s’, Muntham, Itchingfield, Barnes Green, West Sussex RH13 0NH Telephone 01403 731513. No email.
Everett Leeds
Notes from the Chair, 2014
Charne Griffiths CharneGrif@aol.com
IIt has been a year of some concern, some happy visits and meetings, and some sadness.
In January, Committee members were dismayed to find that there was an overspend of £4,000 in our 2013 Budget. I will refer again to this, later in these notes. February saw a well attended visit to Waterperry Gardens, Oxfordshire to see the snowdrops, and also the same day the Wessex group had a well supported talk about the gardens of East Ruston Old Vicarage. Considering the total numbers attending both events, BCS obviously has an active membership. At the end of March there was great sadness when our Vice Chair, Bernard Allen, suddenly passed away. He is still sorely missed.
The Spring meeting/AGM was held at Kidlington and Liz Gibbison was elected as Vice Chair. The remaining four Honorary Officers were re-elected in their respective positions. Unfortunately there were no new nominations for Committee although we still have two vacancies.
Questions, discussions and suggestions from the floor were around the financial situation of the Society. Therefore, I want to indicate the reasons why this overspend has arisen. Membership numbers have dropped steadily, as they have in most plant societies; money on deposit has been earning negligible interest; the costs of printing, stationery, and postage have been rapidly increasing. Also, income from the sales table has dropped considerably, in part because we lack volunteers to run stands at major shows, but even when we do attend, takings are much reduced. Last but not least, the BCS has been subsidising the expenses incurred for national meetings, in order to ensure good speakers and suitable venues, but trying to keep costs down to members. Discussion at the AGM centred around the use of email for the Newsletter, and raising subscription rates. Only three objections to the use of email were noted, therefore Committee are continuing to ask as many members as possible to agree to this as the standard means of communication. Any suggested change to subscriptions, according to the constitution, will have to be put to 2015 AGM and therefore would not be implemented until January 2016.
The Executive Committee, as Trustees of the Charity, are duty bound to address the financial viability of the Society; we are looking how best to reduce costs, without impacting on our activities too much. The Newsletter is an important communication channel for the Society but using email would obviously save considerably on printing, postage and stationery costs. Many other societies now use this gratis method of communication and we would be able to be in touch more frequently, and rapidly, too –for example, reminders about meetings and events could be sent at any time. In order to cut costs on National Meetings, less expensive venues/catering have been explored.
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As suggested by some members, we should also set out to exploit the vast experience of clematis among the existing membership, to provide some speakers and group activities. However, we are keeping in mind that in order to attract new members and to retain existing ones, we do need some interesting speakers from other areas of the gardening world. Committee is continuing to consider subscription levels – but it is important to realise that even if subscriptions were raised by £5.00, this would still not cover the overspend. Therefore, cost cutting measures are still necessary. Any delay in putting these measures in place means that we are using up our limited reserves.
The BCS was represented at the Malvern Spring Festival, and the Midlands group had a stand at Winterbourne Garden, Birmingham, at the end of May. Denise and Alec MacDonald, together with Sylvia Currie and additional support from Simon and Valerie Nicoll, took a stand to the Wolfheze Festival, in Holland. The Northern Group had a stand at Knowsley Flower Show in August and although these smaller venues demand a lot of effort, it does keep the Society in the gardening public’s eye. If members who open their gardens to the public would like to promote the Society, posters and leaflets would be provided.
The calendar of the various BCS events up and down the country was duly compiled. It listed the activities of all of the Regional Groups and it was very interesting to see just how many visits and activities were taking place across the country. Any member/s can join another group’s visit by contacting the group organiser, provided numbers are not limited, of course. It would be good if this calendar could go out earlier; however, some group visits are not finalised until the end of April. If email was used more, this could be sent out as soon as it is ready, and any additions could be quickly notified, later.
Thanks to the splendid work of Keith Shortland and Everett Leeds, the new Trials Ground has been established at the RNRS gardens at St Albans. I would like to thank them for all their efforts to get this started.
By the time you read this, the Autumn Meeting will have taken place – the two main items on the agenda being, firstly, an opportunity to hear about Liz Gibbison’s garden and secondly, a leisurely tour around the world class gardens at Great Dixter.
I should like to finish by expressing my gratitude to the Committee, who have supported me so staunchly this year; also, I want to add a plea to all other members to please, please think about joining the Committee. WE NEED NEW VOLUNTEERS NOW. Please just get in touch.
TREASURER'S ANNUAL REPORT
RESULTS FOR THE YEAR to 31 DECEMBER 2013
The Society made a deficit of £4,286 (2012 surplus £1,045). Volunteers still continue to undertake the majority of day-to-day administration of Society affairs, which would be expensive to provide, if BCS had to pay for external provision of these services.
While the Society still continues to attract new members, in line with the majority of other Plant Societies' experiences, membership numbers have fallen. The finances of BCS still remain strong. The Committee continues to monitor costs. The Society is faced with continuing changes and increased reporting requirements in our affairs, in line with our status as a Charity and the Society maintains specific reserves for such purpose. These summarised accounts do not contain sufficient information to allow for a full understanding of the financial affairs of the Society.
Copies of the Trustees' Annual Report, Independent Examiner's report and Full Accounts can be obtained from the treasurer: Peter Hargreaves, Grafton Cottage, Bar Lane, Barton under Needwood, Burton-on- Trent, Staffordshire, DE13 8AL.
British Clematis Society
Minutes of the 24th Annual General Meeting
Exeter Hall, Kidlington, Oxford OX5 1AB Saturday 5th April 2014.
PPrior to the AGM, in line with the constitution of the BCS, the Event was published in the February Newsletter and members were invited to send proxy votes, if unable to attend and nominate/second individuals for the executive committee. These results were posted on a notice board.
1. The Chair of the Society, Charne Griffiths welcomed 76 members to the meeting, but it was a sombre start to the day as Charne spoke of Bernard Allen, a devoted member of the Society and Vice Chair of the current committee. He passed away suddenly on the 29th March and will be much missed. We all stood for a minute of silence in memory of a popular member and friend to many.
After a brief pause we welcomed our first speaker, Mr Chris Lane, a lecturer at Writtle College and holder of a National Collection of Hamamelis. He gave us a world tour of the plant’s growth and popularity and how to achieve best results. He concluded with a suggested ‘10 best plants’ of the genus.
2. Returning to the business of our AGM, the Chair gave 15 apologies of those unable to attend, all of whom had given their proxy vote to her, if required. The chair also read a letter from Mrs Rosemarie Allen; our condolences were conveyed to her from the meeting. The minutes of the previous AGM at Pershore College on Saturday 6th April 2013 were put to the meeting for accuracy of the proceedings. Mike Brown proposed that the minutes be accepted and Carol Leeds seconded the proposal. The minutes were accepted unanimously. The meeting was then advised that any other matters arising would be covered as the meeting progressed.
Chris Lane gives us an interesting talk on Hamamelis
3. Report from the Chair, Charne Griffiths:
National Events
The Society started this year with a very successful visit to Waterperry Gardens in Oxfordshire. We were very lucky with the weather and had a warm sunny day to enjoy a most knowledgeable talk about snowdrops and a wander round the gardens. It was good to meet up after the storms and floods of the winter. Our two summer visits in 2013 both took place in July. We visited the Garden of the Rose near St Albans on 21st July and the following Friday 26th July, a group of members started a long weekend visit to the gardens of the Isle of Wight, organised by Margaret Morris. It was very interesting seeing the different gardens, some with a lot of clematis and others with other interesting plants or special designs. The fine weather lasted just long enough to complete the tour. The autumn Indoor Meeting was held at Harper Adams University in Shropshire. This venue proved to be spacious, with good facilities for speakers and audience, and enough lunch for take-home bags. Our speakers were Chris Cocks from Taylors Clematis, who told us about the development of the company, the clematis they sell and how he believes you cannot overfeed clematis; and Michael Warren, who explained his love of and specialisation in plant photography, showing many images, some from a number of recent International Clematis Society overseas meetings.
Local Groups
The local groups again had an active and interesting year and their meetings and visits were generally appreciated by members who prefer not to travel so far. The Northern Group visited Yorkshire early and late in the season, including a guided tour of RHS Harlow Carr. Some of their members joined the Midlands Group for a visit to two gardens in North Staffordshire on 3rd August. The Group, (who plan a visit for each summer month, April - September) returned to a village open garden, Meadow Farm, which has an attached nursery, The Bowers, near Eccleshall, with many clematis; and Roy Strong’s garden, The Laskett, among others. The East Anglia Group started their season with two talks and visited two members’ gardens in Suffolk in July. In August they visited Kathy Brown’s garden at Stevington near Bedford. Although the Wessex Group annual lecture date coincided with the national event winter visit to Waterperry Gardens, there was a good attendance for a talk given by Margaret Morris about East Ruston Old Vicarage Gardens. Endeavouring to avoid such clashes is one of the reasons for putting together a composite calendar of events at both regional and national level.
Trials Grounds
I do not propose to say too much about the Trial Ground as Keith will report on this later. However, I am very pleased that we have been able to reach an agreement with the Royal National Rose Society to site a Trial Ground in their trials area at the Garden of the Rose near St Albans. Thank you to those who worked to bring about this agreement.
Press/Publications
I cannot talk about this area without saying what a lot of work was put into press and publications by our sadly departed member Bernard Allen. Just before he died he passed
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over the rôle to Simon Nicoll, having brought all the information leaflets and booklets up to date. He had also produced a number of display charts which can be used as illustrations for talks and at shows. He was always eager to display the educational side of our society and to encourage less confident clematis growers. Now Simon is taking up the baton and trying to interest the gardening world in growing clematis. Simon is putting together the calendar listing both national and regional events, for this year. Please can members responsible for organising events be sure to let him have details as far in advance as possible, so that they can be included. Brian Collingwood again produced a Journal of which we can be proud, and he continues to encourage interest in the Society by the BCS Facebook page that he maintains. This has a link to our website and has led to some new members. I want to thank Jack Gittoes also, for steadily working on, and continually producing Newsletters that keep us up to date with what is happening across the membership and with those in the clematis world, outside the BCS.
Shows
BCS had a stand at Malvern Spring Show last year and will have one again in 2014. Although we do not have members who feel they can undertake the coordination of stands at the larger shows, some are taking information/publicity tables to other venues. The Northern Group set up a stand at the Disley Horticultural Society’s Show and gave advice and encouragement to the public. Denise and Alec MacDonald and Sylvia Currie represented BCS at the Clematis Festival in Wolfheze in the Netherlands. We need to take every opportunity we can to put BCS in the public eye, to try to recruit new members and fulfill our educational role as a charity.
Sunbury Display Garden
The Sunbury Clematis festival was poorly attended in June, in spite of much work by Denise and the local group. The weather was poor, very windy, with rain later. This year the festival has been arranged for 29th June and will coincide with Sunbury Open Gardens.
Membership
Membership continues to shrink, but we do have a steady small drip feed of new members. The Facebook page set up by Brian Collingwood and the website help to collect members via the internet. If we can continue to encourage new membership by personal recommendation and through supporting those members who give talks and demonstrations to garden clubs and other groups, we may be able to ensure the continuation of the Society.
Committee
I have been well supported by the team of committee members who have worked hard to undertake all the necessary administration for running a national Society and to fulfill whatever role they have undertaken: thank you. I am pleased to say that Liz Gibbison has agreed to stand as Vice Chair – this had been proposed some time ago by Bernard, as he had decided to retire from committee. I am grateful to Richard Barker for continuing to give us sound advice over legal matters. There are now two vacancies on
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committee and we need some new committee members to settle in and gain experience, ready to take on some of the officer roles in future years. Even if you have not put your name forward for today, we can always co-opt members until the next election, so please step forward. I also want to thank all the members who undertake tasks for the Society but who are not on the committee; BCS would not continue without your involvement.
Finances
I am afraid I have to finish with a difficult area, finance. As you know, BCS ended the year with a shortfall of £4,000. There are many reasons for this: falling membership, increased postal costs and non-attendance at many shows, amongst them. Your Committee has begun to discuss ways to try to change this, for this year. Overall we need to cut costs and to improve our income. In order to cut costs your Committee has decided to cut out the November edition of the Newsletter, leaving the other three in the same months as at present. It is also necessary to change to sending out Newsletters by email wherever possible, and we will be working on that over the summer. If there is anyone here who has recently got an email address or changed one since they first joined, please can you let us know today. Every member can help to increase BCS income. Firstly, by continuing membership, then by encouraging gardening friends who express an interest to join, attending events and bringing as visitors, potential members, and by using every opportunity to raise the Society profile with the public and promoting our booklets and leaflets for sale. Over the years I have had many enjoyable times with the Society members and I am trying to give back a little now in my current role, but we need every single member to help to ensure the continuation of the British Clematis Society.
4. Annual accounts and report by the Honorary Treasurer, Peter Hargreaves. The treasurer repeated the statement by the chair that the society was running at a £4,000 loss, due mainly to falling membership, and therefore a decline in membership fees received. There were other contributing factors, firstly, the ever increasing cost of postage and continuing low interest rates on deposits in our bank account. Peter made a number of suggestions amongst which were: 1. To increase the cost of membership, although that would be in 2015, coming into effect in 2016, this would therefore take time before we see any benefit; 2. Reduce the number of Newsletters from 4 to 3 per year; 3. Reduce member contact by post where possible and use email. MEMBERS WITHOUT THIS FACILITY WILL BE CATERED FOR; 4. Remind members to ‘Gift Aid’ subscriptions; 5. Make banking changes, to get a tiny bit more interest; 6. Forge ahead to make the Society a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO). This would help protect individuals and the Society against financial loss. The report was proposed for adoption by Mike Brown and seconded by Val Le May Neville Parry and passed unanimously.
5. Report from the Membership Secretary, Linda Crowther. The Membership Report was read by the Chair, in Linda’s absence. As at the date of this AGM, is as follows: At April 2014 there are now 417 paid up members; there are 107 members who have still not renewed their membership, despite prompts from Linda.
6. Trials Ground report, Keith Shortland.
The ground is kindly provided by the Royal National Rose Society at St Albans. It is a west facing slope, somewhat windy and the soil is flinty. The plants – some bought, some donated by Wim Snoeijer, Martin Gibbison, Richard Hodson and Val Le May Neville Parry. They are from a variety of groups. We have purchased 10 obelisks and everything is settling in. The BCS is responsible for the weeding and feeding; that, Keith is dealing with. Great thanks to Everett Leeds, who has done so much to help.
7. & 8. Election of Honorary Officers & Committee. Conducted by Everett Leeds. Liz Gibbison had previously agreed to replace Bernard as the Vice Chair. There were no other changes, although we do need new blood. The committee needs 2 more members. Existing post holders were all proposed, seconded and carried unanimously. The chair encouraged anyone who might like to think about taking on a rôle to contact her or any committee member.
9. Appointment of an Independent Examiner.
The firm of Smith Cooper are willing to continue and were again proposed by Everett Leeds and seconded by Mike Brown. Passed unanimously
10. AOB - Questions from the floor
We requested a show of hands to ask if anyone would object to the use of email for the Newsletter? 3 objections were noted. Could we increase subscriptions immediately? Not according to existing constitution. What if I don’t have email? We will do a short run without resorting to a printer, you won’t miss out. Could we buy a franking machine or use a carrier other than Royal Mail? Already explored and no savings. Clearly, there was a will from the floor to support the Committee and Carol Leeds gave a vote of thanks to the Committee.
After thanking everyone for their support, the Chair closed the AGM business and we went on to relax and enjoy a most enjoyable peep ‘Behind the Scenes at Chelsea’, by Ruth and Jon Gooch of Thorncroft Nursery, many times Chelsea Gold Medalists.
Ruth and Jon Gooch of Thorncroft Nursery put on a superb ‘Chelsea’ slide show
BCS Indoor Meeting 19th October 2013 – REPORT
Editor
WWe had an excellent BCS Indoor Meeting at Harper Adams University College, in Shrewsbury. Although it had rained hereabouts on and off before the weekend, today, Saturday 19th , was a lovely dry, warm and sunny autumn day from start to finish. Approximately 65 members attended; the venue was spacious and excellent for purpose, with the main events being given (morning) by Chris Cocks of Taylors Clematis and (after lunch) by the renowned plant photographer, Michael Warren.
Heather and Brian Cromie arrive; it is their diamond wedding anniversary – Congratulations!
After touching on the historical origins, as well as the current activities of the Nursery, Chris followed with a comprehensive slide presentation talk
The
Chris Cocks takes questions from the floor, following an excellent talk and slide show entitled 'Clematis Throughout the Year'. The talk and slide show covered many aspects of the culture of all the various types of clematis available to gardeners today. Going through all three pruning groups of clematis in turn, Chris described the main flowering characteristics of each group, tips on planting, cultivation, flowering times, growing media, pruning and propagation. During the talk Chris sprinkled in some insights and light-hearted anecdotes in connection with some of the more well known public figures to whom Taylors Clematis has supplied plants, over the years, including the Royal Family.
Time was then given over to members' questions, which Chris answered at length; in the course of which he demonstrated his expertise and massive experience of the genus. The talk went down very well indeed and we were all left wiser for his efforts.
The day’s caterers ought to be congratulated as they put on a truly excellent, tasty lunch, followed by really delectable sweets, cakes and sundries! Please come again!
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Michael Warren is of course very well known throughout the horticultural world for his superb plant photography. He has been illustrating books, periodicals, magazines, catalogues and other resources for well-nigh forty-five years and his expertise in the field is second to none.
We were taken on an illustrated 'grand tour' of his most recent travels, featuring several International Clematis Society trips and visits to various European locations and venues. The talk related his experiences of photographing a very wide range of plants from many genera, both in informal garden style situations and various formal settings. Clematis came up in the mix frequently; we were treated to some quite stunning shots of a wide range of plants from the genus.
Michael then gave time to questions from the floor. Dealing with many diverse points and covering various aspects of his career, we were afforded insights and personal recollections of his work with many famous gardening personalities, over many years.
Judging from the applause, the whole day was greatly enjoyed, by everyone present. There was plenty of time between and after the presentations to acquire items from the BCS Sales Table, buy seeds from the BCS Seed Exchange, buy plants (Taylors made a fantastic range of plants available, many of which were very quickly snapped up) and, last but not least, to drink tea and coffee and chat with clematis friends old and new. There were some interesting seedlings and cuttings available for purchase; they were bought by members, or raffled off with other clematis related items, before the end of the day.
Harper Adams University College - the venue was spacious and excellent for purpose.
BCS Winter Garden Visit - Waterperry Gardens
Bernard Allen (Ed.BernardsentbriefnotesandpicturestomeinMarchofthisyearandIhave amalgamatedthemhere,withkindpermissionofRosemarie.)
NNo less than thirty-one BCS members gathered for the BCS Winter Garden Visit to Waterperry Gardens in Oxfordshire on Saturday 22nd of February. The entire trip, and the arrangements to have expert speaker, Rob Jacobs, present (picture on right) was all meticulously planned by Liz and Annette and went off without a hitch. Indeed, it seemed, Liz and Annette must have organised the weather too, as it was a lovely, bright, wonderful day, with plenty of sunshine thrown in!
As was fitting for the day, we firstly indulged in hot drinks in the excellent café. We were then treated to a super guided tour by the enthusiastic and knowledgeable Rob Jacobs, General Manager of the Waterperry Garden Centre. The extensive and informative excursion took us a good way around Waterperry, with lots of stops and information on some of the four thousand snowdrop varieties in cultivation. In the ornamental gardens alone there were more than sixty different varieties carpeting the ‘snowdrop valley’ area, and it was such a fine sight on the eye that I can say that we truly enjoyed these little heralds of spring, in such a magical setting. If any of our members were not convinced on the beauty of snowdrops before this visit, they certainly were by the time we had finished
The prices of the rarer species and cultivars were a bit of a surprise, but less so when Rob explained the extent of the enormous demand for snowdrops, world-wide.
We have to again thank Liz and Annette for arranging such a brilliant day.
Autumn Visit to Great Dixter: 27th September 2014
Simon & Val Nicoll UK simonnicoll218@btinternet.com
TThirty-five members met in a small lecture room at Great Dixter, and, after coffee, settled down for a presentation by Liz Gibbison. Liz took us on an illustrated year in the garden she has created since moving into her house, Saffron Gate. Covering an acre, the garden was completely overgrown when David and Liz moved in. Being the keen gardener that she is, the first tasks undertaken were the clearance and Arriving at Great Dixter recovery of the garden, followed by the planning and gradual development of a plot which now provides
excellent horticultural interest in every season of the year. Liz invited comments and feedback from the floor and there was a lot of interaction between speaker and audience, with advice, questions and answers flowing in both directions, through the entire talk.
The Sunken Garden
Following a good lunch, we proceeded to the gardens of Great Dixter, at our own pace. The opening point of call was the Sunken Garden, the first of many show-stoppers.
The Exotic Garden
Autumn colour was provided by an amazing array of plants; my eye was particularly caught by a Dahlia with flowers the size of dinner plates. The plants’ growth was quite
spectacular – but it did mean that we couldn’t see any of the labels, so as to be able to identify the plants by name.
In the Walled Garden
We followed on with the Walled Garden, Terrace, and Exotic Garden – which hardly had a square inch of unplanted ground. If allowed to continue to grow like this, soon there won’t be any space left to walk round! After a cup of tea at the Loggia behind the shop, we proceeded to the Long Border. A
It was a remarkable day and all for just £12! Lizzie and Annette are to be thanked for organising everything and giving us such a spectacular day at marvellous Great Dixter.
Around the Garden 2014
Richard Munday UK rmmunday@yahoo.com
IIenjoy reading the BCS Journal to see what other people think of different clematis; here is something about those that I look after, in my home garden. The winter of 2013/14, although very wet, was also quite mild, so I had buds on ‘Omoshiro’ by April 6th. First off the blocks, though, here in Warwickshire, was ‘Mrs Spencer Castle’, on May 5th; followed by ‘Omoshiro’ on the 6th .
I have grown leeks for years but, in 2011, they got some kind of viral disease and went ‘all floppy’. They were never as good as the shop bought ones anyway – probably due to an absence of TLC throughout the growing season – so I decided to stop growing them, and have a row of early large flowered hybrid clematis, instead. Rather disappointingly, of the fourteen planted, only one, ‘Omoshiro’, made a really good display this year, the rest producing just a few flowers. The blooms on ROYAL VELVET (C. ‘Evifour’) and ‘Huvi’ were the nicest. I fed them all with some farm manure, in the autumn, hoping for more flowers. This did not happen but the flowers that were produced were larger. One of the top pieces of advice I’ve seen in the Journal is ‘if you want a good display buy more than one plant’. This recommendation can best be followed in the autumn, when nurseries are selling plants off, at the end of the season. In 2009 I bought two plants of ANNA LOUISE (C ‘Evithree’), which produced the finest display of the ELFHs
this year – it really was quite stunning. My best ever autumn bargain has to be a plant of OO LA LA (C. ‘Evipo041’), for 10p, which I planted in a pot. It lives up to its name and produces masses of lovely flowers, which are not all of the same size. Worth forking out the full price for that one!
Another variety I really like is Clematis ‘Honora’, a gorgeous deep purple. I planted one in the autumn, at the back of the border, buried in the ground but inside a florist’s bucket (with the base removed) to thwart competition around the roots. By mid
I had a plant of KINGFISHER (C. ‘Evipo037’) in the ground, which had wilted several times and appeared dead. I dug it up and put it in a pot, but without much hope of seeing it again; however, in the late spring, it sprang into life and
BLUE ANGEL (‘Błękitny Anioł’)
‘Gipsy Queen’ BCS Slide Library is growing away well. There must be a scientific answer to why the ELFHs grow better in pots, what is it? Conventional wisdom says they like a cool root run but, surely, the roots would be warmer in a container?
Of the late flowering large flowered hybrids, I have two plants of BLUE ANGEL (‘Błękitny Anioł’), which have so far produced reliably good displays. ‘Negritianka’ is a nice deep purple and, as I like purple and white together, I bought the white ‘Maria Cornelia’ to partner it, last year, and that seems promising. I also managed to find a plant of I AM®LADY Q (‘Zoiamladyq’) which grew well – but the flowers can only be viewed through binoculars, as it leapt right up the top of its host, a leggy camellia. Plants of ‘Jackmanii’ and ‘Perle D’Azur’ have produced good displays every year for the last twenty-five years, so, really, you can’t beat the old favourites
This year I have had a forcible reminder of the virtues of patience, when dealing with clematis. Plants of ‘Star of India’ and ‘Gipsy Queen’, planted way back in 2008, which hitherto had only ever produced the odd flower, both produced beautiful displays.
Finally, the cussedness of clematis is exemplified by my plant of ‘Beauty of Worcester’, which I’ve had for years. Initially planted in the garden, it languished, doing nothing, season after season, so I put it in a pot, where it did little better. I had earmarked it for the tip, when it gained a chance reprieve by producing some sumptuous double flowers – the first I’d ever had. Since then it has been back to its old ways and I was, lately, considering jettisoning it again – but in mid August it suddenly produced lots and lots of healthy looking foliage and flower buds, for some inexplicable reason.
IIt’s January and frost sparkles on the feathery fronds of the Zebrinus grasses (Zebra Grass, Miscanthus sinensis ‘Zebrinus’), six feet tall, fading from their autumn gold to silver. It is early in the morning and little stirs in the garden. The birds still sleep; the foxes have been and gone, leaving the compost scattered in their wake. So it is only us who stand underneath the pergola and look in joy at ‘Freckles’ (C. cirrhosa var. purpurascens ‘Freckles’), clothing its post and hanging down over our heads in joyous abundance. At present it is ‘Freckles’ alone that graces our garden. Her little sister, ‘Lansdowne Gem’ (C. cirrhosa var. purpurascens ‘Lansdowne Gem’), of which we have two plants, still sleeps, but will come into flower soon; our Clematis napaulensis is still too young to flower – maybe next year? However, the buds are swelling on ‘Wisley Cream’ (C. cirrhosa ‘Wisley Cream’) and she will be in blossom in a little while. February comes along, wet and miserable, but the pergola is draped in creamy flowers and, still, ‘Freckles’ goes on flowering. The C. armandii grows over the hanging green walls (and the artifact that hides our watering system from view) and begins to trail
‘Lansdowne Gem’ ‘Wisley Cream’ along the fence behind the acers. There is a buzzing, and a fat Queen Bumble (perhaps a white tailed Bombus lucorum) alights on ‘Wisley Cream’ and feeds herself up, before flying off to check the comfrey and the pulmonaria plants, which, in shades of cream, pink and lilac, are also in full flower. Most clematis don’t attract bees, so we need to feed the early risers with other food. The pond ‘meadow’ and bank, rising up behind, is quite well filled
Honey bees and white tailed bumbles foraging on the Heucheracylindrica'Greenfinch'
from mid February through to autumn (with a hiatus in high summer) with native flower species (above); these plants feed the many bees that come to visit. There is even a solitary bee with a long proboscis that feeds especially on the pulmonaria, and the odd Mason bee (genus Osmia). They are crafty though, the bees. We often find small holes
By March the clematis are really beginning to clothe the back fence. ‘Black Prince’ and ‘Purple Spider’ (we have two plants of ‘Purple Spider’, also) intertwine with the chocolate vine (Akebia quinata) and it is necessary to walk up close, to see the dark flowers against the wood fence, shaded by the plum tree and behind the cistus bush. The second ‘Purple Spider’ is flowering too, along and behind the ‘bee and beetle hotel’ .
I count seven clematis in bloom by the end of the month, as ‘Markham’s Pink’ climbs to the top of her frame and shows her delicate pink flowers, before being overwhelmed by the froth of white flowers from the herbaceous Clematis recta ‘Purpurea’, in June. She is held in place by a tall circular frame (as she does not cling and climb) and the flowers are present at the tips of the stems only – but what a froth she forms!
The Clematis 2014
April arrives and we recognise the honey bees (Apis) and white tailed bumbles (Bombus lucorum) foraging amongst the many wild flowers in the garden - they are especially fond of the flowers on the Heuchera cylindrica 'Greenfinch', which stands up, two feet tall, in
stately cream. In the front garden ‘Primrose Star’ (Montana Group) finishes flowering, just missing the stunning blue flowers of C. macropetala ‘Wesselton’, which also wraps itself around the blue fir tree that dominates one side of our pathway. On the other side the herbaceous PETIT FAUCON (‘Evisix’) begins its show, with small dark blue flowers that repeat, if you are lucky, later in the year. On the pergola, ‘Albiflora’ and Clematis × cartmanii ‘Avalanche’ show off their
CRYSTAL FOUNTAIN (‘Fairy Blue’/‘Evipo038’)
‘Lincoln Star’
‘Lincoln Star’ luxurious creamy white blooms. May is here and the sun is high, once more; the garden is awash with the scent of the common valerian (Valeriana officinalis) and the sounds of the bees on the plume thistle 'Atropurpureum' (Cirsium rivulare 'Atropurpureum') and early flowering Argentinian vervain (Verbena bonariensis). On the pergola, CRYSTAL FOUNTAIN (‘Fairy Blue’/‘Evipo038’) displays its amazing flower centres, as it romps upwards, away from the post and into the acers. One post along, ‘Lincoln Star’ parades her huge striped flowers and the scent of the dark red Rosa ‘Souvenir du Docteur Jamain’, climbing up, teases your → nostrils, as you go along the path to admire them. ‘Arabella’ also winds through the acers to show off her purply blue flowers. ‘Miss Bateman’
The Clematis 2014
(of which we have two) graces our front fence and her white flowers match the Camassia leichtlinii ‘Alba’ (quamash) and white arum lilies (Zantedeschia) which stand upright behind the small pond. The Passiflora (on the fence behind) starts to twine her way along the lattice and then flowers profusely; she is a little too strong-minded for the clematis ‘Dark Secret’ and ‘Propertius’, her two companion creepers.
The pergola is host to the June flourish of ‘Polish Spirit’ – she is a very spirited clematis indeed and needs a firm hand to cut back the dead growth and then train her many shoots where you want them. In a good year, her deep purple mixes in with the lilac of the rambling ‘Veilchenblau’, → in which she is well and truly entangled; the contrast is quite stunning.
‘Veilchenblau', too, is a prolific grower and flowerer – together, they make the most amazing spectacle! May to June also sees ‘Fond Memories’ begin to flower. She produces blooms for a very long period, in a very sunny spot, high up on a tall frame in the middle of our grass bed. Climbing alongside her is an unnamed white variety, bought as such. ‘Duchess of Albany’ puts her ravishing show on amongst the roses of the ‘red bed’, and ‘Pangbourne Pink’ pops up here and there, too.
Each pergola post has both a climbing or rambler rose and a clematis growing on it. All the posts are colour themed – from white to pink, to purple and red; the final post is home to a white wisteria. The wisteria is much pampered – or ‘trained’. We thought we had lost it in the floods of last spring, but a root, from far back, began to grow again and now it is up to the top of the pergola; maybe, just maybe, it will flower again next year. The first flush of flowers are huge and white. The second flush are smaller and are more
‘Fond Memories’
lilac in colour. We’re not sure of the variety name; we gather that working out just exactly which particular white ←wisteria one has, can be tricky! We have also now planted up a woodland walk, with arches; there are clematis on several of them, including an (again nameless) yellow variety, planted in late June this year. Even by July (only a month in the ground!) this plant is showing off as being a romper
and will contrast strongly with the pink ‘The Fairy’ rambler, on the other side of her arch. At the back corner of the garden is an abandoned flowering cherry tree (Prunus ‘Amanagowa’) that has sadly departed life, but which nevertheless still serves as a great
climbing structure for the rampant ‘Kermesina’ (Viticella Group) which beautifies it each summer – allowing our neighbours to enjoy ‘Kermesina’, too.
‘Westerplatte’ and PINK CHAMPAGNE (‘Kakio’) fill the gaps among the clerodendron, using them as a climbing support, down by our reading hut, where ‘The President’ now begins its display. July is when we normally open the garden to the public; this is usually a good time for clematis, but 2014 has been tricky. We had a new fence installed during May and this disturbed their growth somewhat, but still we had a small number of flowers on ‘Betty Corning’ , ‘Margaret Hunt’ and BLUE ANGEL (‘Błękitny Anioł’); nevertheless, ‘The President’ flowered profusely, even if on a shorter length of fence than normal.
← Clematis EMPRESS (‘Evipo011’) is growing like mad over the two pyramids just below the patio – she has a dominant nature and has suppressed the ‘Princess
Our unknown yellow Diana’, proudly commanding the summit. Meanwhile, the subjugated ‘Princess Diana’ romps around, lower down, making it very difficult to walk along the path at the bottom of the patio, which has therefore been given over to her, the astrantia and the geraniums. Clematis flammula briefly attempted to make it to the top but, alas, she was still not strong enough! FILIGREE (‘Evipo029’) pops her head over the top of her hanging basket; she bumps herself into you as you walk past the end of the pergola. Meanwhile, in the front garden, ←Clematis × durandii proudly exhibits her huge, dark blue flowers, amongst the green of the new cornus stems. She will flower all the way through until September, or even October, if the weather is suitable – as will ‘Arabella’ . Alas, October is a more difficult month for clematis – the
The Clematis 2014
Clematis cirrhosa-types are not yet in bud and, by now, the summer hybrids are mostly gone or fading away. November sees the clematis year begin again, as ‘Freckles’ begins her first flush of flowers; in most years the flowers continue to appear until February.
← FILIGREE (‘Evipo029’) in basket
See Elayne’s excellent blog at: www.tiggerrenewing.wordpress.com
Each July – check dates by email – Elayne & Jim Coakes welcome visitors to their 9 year old garden, a haven for wildflowers, bees and numerous other species of wildlife. The following plants are expected to be in full flower then: agapanthus, fuchsias, astrantia, grasses and cirsium atropurpureum, as well as buddleia bushes, roses and clematis.
Part of the NGS Yellow Book annual Open Gardens, there are three interesting garden areas to see. The Award winning front garden also features a pond as well as older roses associated with the Arts and Crafts Mapesbury Estate and Gertrude Jekyll’s original planting designs where colour and scent were important. The abundance of climbers and clematis plants has led to the garden being featured in a future TV series and in a Japanese Lifestyle Magazine and book. Entrance £3.50p: all to NGS charities including Macmillan, Marie Curie, Help the Hospices and many others.
Tunbridge Wells in Bloom
Edward James Gilbert, Thunder Bay, Ontario edwardgilbert@shaw.ca
TThe County of Kent has long been known as the ‘Garden of England’ and there can be no doubt that the spectacular and award winning public and private gardens of Tunbridge Wells have contributed to this honorary title.
In the spring the town is ablaze with apple blossom and many early clematis and the surrounding woods are awash with beautiful deep purple bluebells, possibly one of nature’s most striking spectacles, adorning the extensive countryside.
The wild clematis ‘Travellers Joy’ (Clematis vitalba) is found in abundance. A specimen gathered in Tunbridge Wells was detailed in The Flowering Plants of Tunbridge Wells and Neighbourhood by Richard Deakin MD, an amateur botanist (1809-1873). This wonderful book gives painstaking descriptions of the plants he found in the area, and is superbly illustrated, with upwards of 800 monochrome engravings. It was printed by the firm of Stidolph & Bellamy of Tunbridge Wells in 1871 and published by Groombridge and Sons in London. Richard authored this book while living in Tunbridge Wells; he died in the town only two years after completing it.
Each year a Tunbridge Wells in Bloom competition is held. In 2013, Jack Ward, local cycle shop owner, won a silver medal for his entry – a lady’s bike installed on his shop roof, with clematis climbing over it. Dunorlan Park, a favourite place in the hearts of plant lovers, again won gold, in the category of public parks, for their splendid gardens.
Caroline Nevill
Dunorlan is known locally for featuring many and various types of clematis cultivars.
The town’s fascination with plants no doubt began in the 1600s, when it was first settled but it was in the 19th century that large scale interest in plants burst forth, as the selection of flora available to the public increased. In that century the horticultural needs of the community were served by the well known clematis specialist Thomas Cripps, assisted in his nursery and flower shop business by his two sons, daughter and a large staff. Mr Cripps was not alone in this; two other nurseries of the period, namely Charleton’s Nursery, and Hollamby’s Nursery in nearby Groombridge, also fed the residents’ appetite for flowers, shrubs and trees of all types. Groombridge Place, once a large private estate, now open to the public, boasted extensive and elaborate gardens, with many clematis put to good effect in its herbaceous borders.
The Horticultural Fête of 1851, attended by royalty, various dignitaries and thousands of locals, was a big success. The gardeners, representing the owners of large estates, grew clematis in abundance amongst their assortment of flowering plants, and competed for prizes. Many estate owners had their own gardeners living on the estate and it is no wonder, considering the combination of money and manpower, that some spectacular
grounds were created. Horticultural shows in the town have always been put on with great enthusiasm and have consistently been well attended. The Spa Hotel (built in 1795 as a private residence, converted into a Spa facility in 1878 and refashioned ultimately into a Grand Hotel on sixty acres of landscaped grounds, in 1899) was, throughout the 20th century, the site of an annual flower show organised by the Tunbridge Wells Horticultural Society. This hotel is today still a featured destination as part of the Chelsea Flower Show; coach tours of the town and surrounding area are arranged, with several nights’ accommodation at the Spa Hotel included in the package. Those taking in this event get to visit some of the finest gardens in the area and clematis lovers are never disappointed.
Artists of the time made a point of setting up their easels in grand local gardens such as the Blackhurst Estate, painted by Ernest Arthur Rowe (1862-1922). Rowe moved to
Tunbridge Wells at the beginning of the 20th century, specialising in painting formal gardens and the surrounding countryside. Rowe demonstrated a quite unique ability to capture the minutest detail. Over the years his subjects included many local gardens plus others throughout the entire south of England, which he toured by train and bicycle during the summer. He would then relocate, abroad, to paint during the colder months.
The Victorians often grew clematis in containers, bringing them indoors as soon as they came into flower. Nowadays, especially with so many people gardening on small patios, we are more likely to leave them outdoors as part of a permanent display, but otherwise, as far as growing in containers is concerned, things are exactly the same. With pot-grown plants, you have complete control and can put them into the spotlight when the flowering starts, then tuck them well out of sight, for the rest of the year.
(Ed. The TunbridgeWellsSandFormationis a geological unit which forms part of the Wealden Group and the uppermost and youngest part of the unofficial Hastings Beds. These geological units make up the core of the geology of the Weald in the English counties of West Sussex, East Sussex and Kent. The other component formations of the Hastings Beds are the underlying Wadhurst Clay Formation and the Ashdown Formation.)
Geology of Tunbridge Wells
Image Wikipedia Commons
The Clematis 2014
In my research on clematis in Tunbridge I discovered that more than one local resident had been named after the plant, including a certain Clematis Welsby. Indeed, although not as popular as ‘Rose’ or some other flowers, it certainly has not been overlooked in the naming of children, generally; in Roman times there was even a Bishop of Thrace named ‘Clematis’. Also, several residences in Kent, including one in Tunbridge Wells , were given the name of ‘Clematis Cottage’, with, no doubt, Clematis to be found in abundance in the gardens. Even roads have been named for the plant – several examples including Clematis Street and Clematis Road exist in the County (although none are found in Tunbridge Wells itself). A review of estate agents’ listings of homes in the town showed a surprising number of them making specific mention of clematis in the garden, confirming its great popularity. There is even a wedding shop in Tunbridge which offers for sale a lovely wedding gown named…. ‘Clematis’. With more than seventy varieties of clematis available at the nurseries of Tunbridge Wells, it is clear that this plant is still very much admired.
Bibliography
The Flowering Plants of Tunbridge Wells and Neighbourhood Richard Deakin; 1871, London, Groombridge & Sons.
CCarol & I have recently visited Lytes Cary Manor, near Charlton Mackrell, Somerton in Somerset (What wonderful names, I wonder where they came from?). It is now owned by the National Trust, having been restored from virtual ruin by the previous owner. A delightful property with 13th Century origins, built and owned by the Lyte family, who lived there until 1748, when bankruptcy (through gambling, etc) forced them to leave.
On our trip around the property we came across an original copy of Lyte’s Herbal by Henry Lyte, printed in 1578, set in a glass cabinet covered with a dark cloth that could be rolled back for closer inspection. Paragraphs detailing the various herbs and their uses were set out in alphabetical order and by strange co-incidence the page, opened at the letter ‘C’, included Clematis. It mentioned C. flammula which we would all recognise and also C. altera which is unknown to me or to the Clematis Register. Lyte extolled the virtues of the seed ‘taken with water or mixed with honey and water’. For what benefit, though, was not apparent.
The mystery remains, What, Where and When is Clematis altera? Answers on a postcard to……Everett Leeds.
[Ed. John Howells wrote: In classical Greek our plant was named by, for example, Dioscorides, as 'clematitis' (connected to clematis) or 'clematides' (resembling clematis). 'Clematis' was reserved for periwinkle (Vinca). Dioscorides also used the term Clematis altera for the clematis that were not periwinkles (altera - 'the other'). Clematis viticella was known to the Greeks and the Romans, being native to their countries. The four blue tepals of the viticella would invite comparison with periwinkle. At some point in the late medieval the name left the periwinkle and firmly stood for Clematis viticella.]
Silver Star Vinery
Roy W. Nunn UK roy_angela_nunn@btinternet.com
TThis year (July 2014) Angela and I were invited by our friend Debbie Fischer to attend her open weekend at Silver Star Vinery, near the small town of Yakolt in Washington State, USA, where I was to give two talks to attendees on the merits of growing clematis in gardens.
View through the trees to the clematis trials area (inset, Debbie, Angela & Denis) The nursery is overlooked by the Silver Star Mountain and is in a forest location, adjacent to the Lewis River. The main features of the nursery are the extensive gardens. Areas have been sympathetically cleared from the forest, in order to create display spaces for clematis, and garden areas where clematis are grown with other plants, trees, shrubs,
The Clematis 2014
and so on. The garden also has a collection of hydrangeas, which benefit from being grown in the shade of Silver Pines. The working area, where liners are grown on, to provide plants for sale, is cleverly concealed from view behind dense swathes of garden. Silver Star Vinery relies on mail order for the major part of its plants sales business.
One of the newly created gardens
This nursery should certainly be an inspiration both to those new to gardening as well as the professional. It certainly impressed me when we visited with the International Clematis Society, in 2010, and to see the extensive alterations that have taken place since this visit was also very remarkable. Debbie’s comment was that this is still a ‘work in progress’.
Clematis‘Cleminov 51’ (SAPHYRA® INDIGO)
The Clematis 2014
It was difficult to pick out the most appealing display but the combination of C. ‘Prince Charles’ with C. ‘Princess Diana’ was very spectacular. It was also good to see a well grown specimen of Clematis ‘Semu’, as this is one of my favourites in our garden. Also,
Clematis ‘Cleminov 51’ (SAPHYRA® INDIGO) was very impressive. The clematis that inspired me most was the flowering of C ‘Joe Zary’, bearing in mind that this Atragene has its main flowering period in spring. It was amazing, in July, to see so many flowers on the sale plants. I found it interesting to wander the extensive lines of the trial/display area, which is interspersed with various herbaceous plants, roses and shrubs. There is obviously a lot of care and attention being applied by the owner, in which her sense of humour also shines through, with an appropriate (or sometimes inappropriate!) sign, or item.→
C. ‘Semu’
After the weekend, Debbie treated us to numerous trips out into the surrounding countryside. These included a visit to Mount St Helens, where we saw vast swathes of
Above and below, C. ‘Joe Zary’
The Clematis 2014
Lupinus Lepidus var. lobbii growing in the pumice (close to the extent of the tree line) that had been expelled during its eruption some years ago. We journeyed down to the Lewis River, where we came across Monotropa uniflora – the Ghost Plant or Indian Pipe –growing in deep shade in the pine forest. This plant has entirely white stems, leaves and flowers. We also visited Cistus Nursery to view the extensive range of unusual plants they have to offer. Among them was a most impressive Clematis tibetana subsp. vernayi –very finely divided foliage and bearing huge yellow flowers with extremely thick sepals.
On we went, to Luscher Farm to meet Linda Beutler and Brewster Rogerson. We had arranged to have a guided tour of Brewster’s Clematis collection, with Brewster himself, and to get his views on the progress of the scheme since our previous visit in 2010 – but that, as they say, is another story!
Thank you Debbie, Denis, Rosie, Sadie, Pete Trunky and, especially, Diva, for allowing me to become her friend.
FromWikipedia:SilverStarMountainis an extinct volcano in the southwestern Cascade Mountains in the U.S. state of Washington, named for the pattern of five prominent ridges that radiate from the summit in the shape of a star. Washington. The two peaks of the mountain dominate the horizon east of Vancouver, Washington. The mountain is the focus of the Silver Star Scenic Area. Silver Star Mountain is the center of a pluton of magma that was injected into the area 20 million years ago and cooled to solid rock under the surface, producing small deposits of gold, zinc, copper, zeolites, quartz and calcite.
Clematis native to Pescia, Italy; ‘Traveller's Joy’ is such a perfect name!
Massimo Mazzoni Italy massymassi@hotmail.com
[Ed. Massimo Mazzoni is the owner of the clematis nursery ‘Vivaio delle Clematidi’ in Pescia, Tuscany, Italy. Max describes for us how he has got to know the local native species of Tuscany, Clematisvitalbaand Clematisflammula . Pescia, on the banks of the homonymous river, is located about half way between Lucca and Florence, in the province of Pistoia, near to Pisa. It is very well known for its flower markets and for ‘Pinocchio’, the author having been born in the small nearby hamlet of Collodi. The economy is mainly based on the growing of flowers, especially carnations, and paper production. The Tuscan countryside is an area of outstanding natural beauty adorned with cultural treasures.]
IIn my home region, the province of Pistoia , central Italy, the two most commonly occurring and widely distributed native clematis are Clematis vitalba and Clematis flammula. During my many excursions out into the beautiful Tuscan countryside, I have had the great pleasure of encountering these indigenous species time and time again; over the years, I have come to know and understand their characteristics and to appreciate their stunning, yet relatively unheralded beauty.
Of the two, the most prevalent is Clematis vitalba. In Italy it is known by the species name C. vitalba, or ‘vitalbino’ (white vine) or ‘barba di vecchio’ (Old man’s beard). Prior to seeing it in its natural habitat, I had never really given it much notice or attached any great importance to it. But in its innate environment, it’s a different story.
One has to understand the mammoth scale this plant grows and flowers on. Where no suitable vertical host exists, it will course, rampantly, into open fields and meadows. But, being a Clematis, it is more usual to see it climbing. During its evolution this plant has learned to cope with the most difficult circumstances – that of competing with the dense growth of other large plants (trees and woody shrubs) by piggy-backing on their own vertical structures, in the fight for light. It then overlays and occupies huge swathes of the host’s canopy, where it flowers in superabundance. In forests, it is everyday to see large lianes making their way up the trunks and through branches, to reach the light at the top. It can be so aggressive that it overruns many other plant colonies, and I have frequently seen other vigorous plants literally choked off by tides of C. vitalba.
When walking through the woods local to my area, it is very easy to detect her. The plant develops, over time, long thick, trailing and hanging lianes which run from the ground all the way up to the top of acacias, elms or elder; you spot them straight away and then you know for certain that you are in the territory of Clematis vitalba.
C.vitalbafoliage→
For me, what dawned was that although the individual flowers are small and simple, they are produced in such profusion as to give a quite astonishing effect, en masse, even from a distance. It reminds me that nature can not only produce incredible floral beauty in complex single blooms, but, also, by means of elegant and abundant simplicity.
The cloud-like, myriad profusion of small white flowers at first have a central greenish tinge, the stamens soon becoming pure white. The billowing mass pours out a
sweet perfume, almost reminiscent of honey (this, of course, is a marvellous attraction for bees, which avidly visit the flowers, in performing their daily foraging activities). Here
Clematisvitalba
and there, dotted among the dense white, one sees the slightly furry, faintly darker green, younger flower buds –soon to follow on, but, as yet, unopened. As previously alluded to, in the wild the plant is equally happy to ramble on the horizontal, over other low shrubs and plants. As an example of what I mean, just recently I was quite bowled over by C. vitalba in a way I’d never been before; I was out on a walk along the old Roman aqueduct in Lucca, about a half hour’s car journey away from Pescia, when I came upon a meadow filled with vegetation. As I got closer, I could see it was a rampant growth of briars, blackberry and
The Clematis 2014
C. vitalba, all entangled together, like a tide rolling forward, totally covering and blotting out the ground, several feet thick. There were broad swathes of the deep red of unripe berries, and large patches of the jet black of the mature; the C. vitalba had spawned, as though nature herself had designed it, a mosaic of large, dense splashes of small white flowers, with greenish yellow stamens, in perfect harmony with the red and the black of the fruit. A magical, stirring combination!
Top, Clematisvitalba,flowers;bottom, C.vitalbagrowing in an open field
Clematisvitalbain a small tree
Needless to say, experiencing C. vitalba in its natural habitat has completely changed my perspective and revised my whole appreciation of this wonderful species of clematis. I now truly understand why this plant is so fittingly named ‘Traveller’s Joy’. I also love to happen across ←Clematis flammula on my trips out. I really do love and adore this special species. As with C. vitalba, the individual flowers are only very small, but they are produced in such immense quantities that the overall effect, especially from distance, is
Clematisflammula,profusion of flowers spellbinding. Usually, one sees it growing in open fields, more or less solitary, or, the other most frequent situation, growing into olive trees, which are native and quite widespread in my area. In association with the olive, the contrast of the green and brilliant leaves of the C. flammula with the green-grey of the olive foliage is quite stunning; furthermore, the perfume emanating from those beautiful starry flowers is heavenly; a fresh, potent almond bouquet that pours out, filling the air and the nostrils.
The plant itself always looks splendidly healthy and strong, even though, in our region and elsewhere in Italy, the olive is grown on dry, unirrigated land. Seeing this plant produce such fabulous growth and enormous flowerings in such conditions really impresses me – the plant can survive in arid conditions, in average soil… and still always puts on a fantastic flowering show. And this makes me admire it all the more.
Comparing the two species, I would say that Clematis flammula is the more elegant and attractive plant, in its overall growth habitat and appearance. Even in open
fields, the plant looks marvellous; the clouds of brilliant white flowers stand in such lovely contrast to the green background. My view is that this is a much underrated species which could be of huge value in many garden settings, so long as a little attention is given with regard to siting, irrigation and proper pruning. If you don’t know this plant, you are really missing out on a seriously beautiful, easy to grow and very rewarding clematis. The beauty of the innumerable simple flowers, with their incredible density of colour, really ought to be much more widely recognised and appreciated.
Tuscanyis a region in Italy having an area of about 23,000 square km (8,900 sq mi) and a population of about 3.8 million. The regional capital is Florence. Tuscany is known for its landscapes, history, traditions, artistic legacy and its permanent influence on high culture. It is regarded as the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance and has been home to many influential figures in the history of art and science. Tuscany is famous for its wines, including the famed Chianti, Vino Nobile di Montepulciano, and Brunello di Montalcino. It has an immense cultural and artistic heritage, expressed in the region's churches, palaces, art galleries, museums, villages and piazzas. Many of these artifacts are found in the main cities, such as Florence and Siena; others are found in smaller villages and towns, scattered around the region. Over: C.flammula→
Pruning Montana Plants
Valerie Le May Neville-Parry UK val.lmnp@icloud.com
s you undoubtedly know, Montanas are group 1 – no pruning necessary unless you wish to keep growth in a confined space. If this is the case, then pruning should be carried out immediately after flowering – I usually recommend by mid-June – to give the new growth maximum opportunity to ripen, survive the winter and give a good display the following spring.
When planting new Montanas I cut back any long stems to just above the second pair of leaves, feed and water well. This will encourage new stems from underground and two new stems from each of the cut back vines.
I was given the wonderful C. ‘Van Gogh’, in 2005. It is grown in a tree pot and is a firm visitor favourite. It is the deepest pink, the first Montana to flower each spring and holds its tepals for at least six weeks. There is a delicate perfume and some of the later flowers are semi-double. What more could you ask for? Each year, after the last tepals have dropped, I prune all vines back to between 30-50cm. This is essential because I need to tip it out of its pot, root prune and refresh the compost, every three or four years. As well as growing delicious new purple vines and leaves, the flowers remain from eye level, there are no old, unproductive vines, no leaves to sweep up (!) and the display stays in its allotted area on the south facing wall of my bedroom patio. By September each year I have good new growth which ripens and carries masses of flowers the following spring.
However, sometimes other timing is forced upon us. Having lost a good many mature trees over the wet and windy winter 2013-14, most of them hosting massive C. montana
Clematis 2014
plants – I have had to erect new and sturdy host structures. The plan was to complete the task before the end of June but things didn’t quite work out.
Having ordered six 15’ telegraph poles and arranged delivery, to my horror a massive lorry and trailer arrived – far too big to turn round at the end of The Drove. (I had told them about the limited access.) So the driver backed down the track – which is very narrow and not exactly straight! The air was blue with neighbours yelling about broken branches and damaged edges to the track. Eventually the driver reached the end of the straightest part of the track but couldn’t back round the corner far enough to drop the poles over my gate – the crane was on the front of the tipper! So he dropped them on the grass, some 30 metres from my gate. It was another month, with three strong local lads lifting, pushing and rolling them along the sodden track before we eventually got them onto the concrete area at the top of my west paddock. And another £100 into the bargain. There they lay for over a month whilst I tried to work out how on earth we were going to move them the necessary 50 metres to their final position.
The first tree surgeon said he could take them back along the track, into and across my east paddock and into the garden. He had heavy lifting gear and digger with a massive drill. He would then lift the poles and drop them into position. ‘Easy’ he said! He moved them as agreed and eventually put two in place – but dug the holes 3’6” instead of the required 5’ deep. Consequently both poles were at an angle and, in addition, my lawn had massive ruts where the digger had driven whilst carrying the heavy poles. I could have cried. Another £200. The cost was getting prohibitive and the poles still weren’t in.
It was another six weeks, 18th July, before I could arrange for Keith and a second tree surgeon, Daniel, to come and rectify the damage. They worked incredibly hard on a
The Clematis 2014
boiling hot day, taking down two dead cherries and setting all six poles and joining rope in position by 8pm that night. Daniel brought his wife and two little children and we had a picnic lunch. The children played at ‘tree surgeons’. This time I could have cried with relief! The supports were in, at last. And it looked good.
Poles finally in place
The result of Keith and Daniel’s efforts
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Thank goodness for our Indian summer. There is great new growth on all but one established Montana (which wasn’t doing well before I lost the trees). I have also planted another eight Montanas which should give a magnificent display within a year or two. All of these vigorous, young new plants have already started climbing their poles.
Regrowth of ‘Crinkle’, rapidly covering her Buckingham arch
You may remember that last year I wrote an article about the demise of the host sycamore tree for ‘Crinkle’ and ‘Miss Christine’? Well, good news about both Montanas. ‘Crinkle’ now has very graceful new growth growing through her new Buckingham arch support and chain. ‘Miss Christine', which has a thicker, stiffer growth habit, has rapidly climbed back up her post and is now winding her way along the chain link. In early June 2014 I cut all bar one of ‘Miss Christine’s old stems (planted in 2005) back to just above a leaf node at about a metre from the ground. Within a couple of months there are now
The Clematis 2014
dozens of long new stems both from below ground and from the cutting points. So, in 2015 I should once again have fabulous white, perfumed flowers along the whole length
‘Miss Christine’ regrowth - already at top of pole and on chains of ‘Miss Christine’ and the dainty pink flowers of ‘Crinkle’ dripping down over her Buckingham arch and along the chain joining the poles.
Everett Leeds
Referendum on Pruning the Wemyss Montanas
Charlotte Wemyss UK charlottewemyss14@gmail.com
IIam not sure who suffered the most worry – ourselves, about the Referendum result or my Montana Clematis Collection when they heard the swish of the shears. Either way, they are both now gone.
The Montanas have had, in barber parlance, a No. 1 cut. They surely needed it as they were all hanging two to three feet from the walls and most of the top wires had either fallen off or become detached in some way. It has taken me twenty years to realise that it
The Clematis 2014
is, of course, much easier if support wires are put on the walls in sections, rather than the whole way across; obviously they can then be repaired in individual segments, which is considerably less trouble and takes half the time. However, after the drastic cut of two weeks ago, this performance will hopefully not need to be repeated for another couple of years or more. Last year I had let them get way out of hand – I was nervous of cutting them back in case they did not flower in profusion during the Montana Clematis Festival that we held (in aid of the Maggie Centre Charity) last May. As it turned out, I need not have worried; they were truly fantastic.
After
Having not had a Collection for too long, I am slightly hazy about some things, pruning being one of them; however, I have bitten the bullet and taken advantage of the incredible late summer weather. With my heart in my mouth the Big Chop has now taken place and they are ALL reduced by half – the walls are now looking quite naked. I, on the other hand am thrilled; it is all done, and before October to boot! All have had a generous feed of Vitax Q4 and manure in some cases. I have also removed several of the older plants that I put in twenty years ago (now replanted outside the walled garden, so, not forgotten!) because they were either in the wrong place or had completely overrun their allotted space; some of them had trunks as big as trees and were occupying places where I now want to plant civilized, non rampant roses.
Every single one of my clematis flowered this year, to a greater or lesser degree, with only a few deaths to report. ‘Purple Dream’ hates me, and continues to be my ‘Purple Nightmare’. I have now successfully killed three of them, one after the other. Equally,
FOREVER FRIENDS (‘Zofofri’) does not appear to want to be friends with me at all; I am now down to one survivor from the original six that were planted. ‘Yukikomachi’ would, I think, much prefer to be in Japan rather than here at Wemyss Castle.
The new love of my life, ‘Caroline’, came into her own this year, scrambling up an archway and through Rosa ‘New Dawn’; she looked completely ravishing and was in fantastic flower for almost two months. ‘Victoria’ is also new in my life. I planted a good number of her, all along the catmint bed of eighty metres and they slowly began to flower on top of the catmint, looking just like the ‘butterflies’ that I had envisaged. ‘Dr Ruppel’ went completely crazy, as did ‘Daniel Deronda’, romping spectacularly through the Ceanothus and Actinidia. There are too many to comment on individually, really, but it must be said that my three ‘Diamond Ball’ plants, all in one pot, scrambling through a white hydrangea, were magnificent.
Gardens are ever-changing with the seasons and there are always new ideas to consider, and occasional winter disasters to deal with. Whilst I do love my gardens for all that they give, they are, inescapably, far too big! None of us is getting any younger and help is hard to find, not to mention expensive. I have had to try to think of the best ways I can reduce the workload, yet still retain the romantic vision that I strive towards. To this end, I have removed several of the herbaceous borders and replaced them with gravel beds and pots; this seems to be working well and has certainly reduced the weeding considerably.
I am now embarking on a ‘wild flower bank’ above the tennis court – this is on a slope covered with couch grass and is impossible to mow, so it always looks scruffy. I have got as far as rotovating it and we will see what happens after the seed is sown and germinated. As I write this, I wonder whether this might not end up as another ‘mammoth work in progress’, but the intention is good and hopefully it may just ‘look after itself’. This is the aim, anyway. Hopefully, whichever are the strongest among the wildflowers will root, flourish and be rampant. Time will tell.
This year has been a fantastic gardening year in Scotland. We have had a wonderful summer and the gardens have never looked better. So, on we go and I hope that my Montanas will survive the fright of the haircut and, praise the Lord, we are all still members of the United Kingdom!
Everett Leeds
Vigorous Natives and Thoughts on their Pruning
Dr John Feltwell UK john@wildlifematters.com
TThe storm of 28th October 2013, in East Sussex, did me a favour – it found the weakness in a Siberian Elm (Ulmus pumila); a bifurcation in the main trunk into which (unbeknown to me) rain had seeped in and rotted out the core – and brought the ton of trunk down on an established clump of Clematis montana. This plant had formed a massive ball of vegetation over an unsuspecting Bullace (Prunus domestica subsp. insititia) (an introduced species), which it had used as a host, and killed by light deprivation. Montanas do not always kill their hosts if given plenty of space, and are, of course, superb in producing fantastic curtains of contrasting colours, in spring.
Clematismontanausing a laburnum as a host, reaching into the canopy to make a colourful display (Dame Miriam Rothschild’s Northamptonshire garden, 2002)
The display of this C. montana was always a 100% colour-block, in white suffused with pink, accompanied by an audio of busy honeybees1. The favour granted to me was in removing the need to know how best to prune it, as the Elm trunk had smashed it all to the ground.
One wonders why it is necessary to prune any Montana, unless space is restricted, as they get on just fine by themselves, using any suitable host plant. So, this C. montana did not flower in 2014. It was cut back to fibrous stems as thick as your wrist and, within a few weeks, the most delicate new shoots appeared from what seemed to be impossibly fibrous ‘woodwork’, and by July it was up to its old trick of completely covering the adjacent trelliswork with foliage – all set for a
The Clematis 2014
good showing in 2015. No pruning this year at all. The lesson learned about overgrown bushes of clematis? Cut it all off near ground level in early spring: you will miss a season’s flowers depending on the extent of the cutting back, but gain a lot of space, and be well ready for the next season. Regeneration power is not diminished.
Another Montana, C. montana var rubens ‘Odorata’, growing up a Wild Service tree (Sorbus torminalis) (an increasingly infrequent native tree) – is a complete tangle of thatch, dead on the inside – the way I pruned it last year was basic – with a chain-saw.
This was reasonably effective, not to cut it down to the ground or cut through the main stems, but to try to remove some thatch, whilst still leaving it to flower in the same season. Putting the chain-saw to it had no effect on the overall thatch, which seems to be just as thick, a few months later. Flowering was the same as before, with audio and visual attractions again.
My preferred pruning methods tend to be ‘no pruning’ unless to cut back to stop encroachment, because I do like the vigour that comes as a default with native European clematis. Vigour is not confined to European natives, though; in Sussex I took a picture of a Japanese indigenous species, Clematis terniflora, which has a similar force to that of a British native, flowering over a rooftop.
I tried putting in a variety of non-native clematis (that had been in pots for too long) to make a ‘wall of clematis’ up a trellis, for the summer, thinking that they would do much better out of their pots; but this did not seem to work for ‘Hagley Hybrid’ or ‘Snowbird’, or the others; these hybrids lack a high level of vigour. Perhaps the most vigorous clematis in Europe is C. vitalba (Old Man’s beard), of which some observations have already been made in The Clematis for England and France (Cévennes)2. In France it
C.montanavar. rubens‘Odorata’, growing through a Wild Service tree
The Clematis 2014 vies with wild grape, Vitis sp. in reaching thirty feet plus, up to the top of alder trees (Alnus glutinosa). Japanese indigenous species, Clematis terniflora, on a rooftop in Sussex
Once there, it gradually smothers the top branches, leaving the trees vulnerable to wind and storm damage through being overly top heavy and encumbered. Once established, the species is successful in any garden; in the wild, it uses its powerful liana-like growths to force access to the canopy, where it produces its flowers and fruits. The higher it grows, the better for wider seed dispersal. C. vitalba has evolved so as to be able to master forests; man-made mere hedgerows are subjugated as a matter of course.
Clematis flammula, the late summer-flowering Virgin’s Bower3, has another strategy: it is equally energetic in throwing out plenty of vigorous shoots, but flammula does it mostly horizontally, rather than vertically. It has a propensity for ‘bushiness’ – but it can climb to a metre or more, if it finds the right host. I have often seen it in the beautiful French Cévennes mountains, where it carpets the ground with its relatively delicate but prolific shoots, consisting of large green stems and myriad upon myriad of starry-white flowers. Recently I happened by one flowery terrace (approximately 30m × 5m) on which there was at least one plant every square metre and this was replicated elsewhere around the area. Left alone, it competes successfully with, and finds space within, Bramble (Rubus complex), Meadow Clary (Salvia pratensis), Knapweed (Centaurea nigra) and Field Scabious (Knautia arvensis) – as a veritable and agreeable companion to these other species, in the wild. Further observations3 on C. flammula have been made in previous articles in The Clematis, particularly its power of flowering stridently even in the face of the fiercest Mediterranean sun. My specimen, in England, this year produced plenty of vigorous growth and started flowering in early August, lasting well over two months.
REFERENCES
1: Feltwell, J. 2012. Clematis and Honeybees. The Clematis p51-53.
2: Feltwell, J. 2013. When Vine becomes Liana. The Clematis p.51.
3: Feltwell, J. 2010. Clematis flammula The Clematis p.80-82.
RRecently the Saturday Daily Telegraph has been running an advert under their auspices for C. ‘Princess Kate’ together with compost, trellis, food and container for the princely sum of about £25 (not the exact amount, as I can’t find the cheque stub!) I just wondered what it was all about and thought to myself, let’s give it a try to see what they have made of it. It eventually arrived and the concerned delivery driver looked at me and said, ‘It’s heavy, do you want me to carry it inside?’ I thanked him for his consideration but I said, ‘No, it will be OK’. Just to digress for a moment, some months back a young man offered me his seat on the Underground – the first time it had ever happened to me – and that really played on my mind for some time, the realisation of ‘getting old’.
Anyway, back to ‘Princess Kate’. It was indeed quite heavy but this was down mainly to the enclosed bag of compost which was size 25 ltr. The trellis turned out to be plastic, the plastic container 35cm (14ins) in diameter and 30cm (12ins) deep and it was accompanied by a plastic tray to sit on.
The plant itself was just a small cutting in a 7cm pot with a reasonable root structure, the inference being it was alright to plant the cutting straight into the large pot supplied. I can hear clematarians and switched-on gardeners exclaiming !!!! at this point. I just wonder who in their wisdom thought this offer up? OK, for some recipients this kit might work but I suspect for the majority it will end in failure and another nail will be driven into the clematis coffin. Short term gain (profit) will turn into long term loss (‘I can’t grow clematis and will not be buying any more’).
Reflections from our Nursery
Linda Clarke UK linda@longcombenursery.com
[Ed. In just ten years, Linda has developed her start-up clematis nursery ‘Simply Clematis’ into an established specialist source, including internet mail order: Linda shares some reflections, with several images of some of her favourites.]
OOur journey with Clematis, in all their forms, started not long after we arrived at Longcombe Nursery, some ten or so years ago. We had a love for all sorts of different plants and wanted to share that love with our customers. We opened our nursery on the outskirts of Totnes in the beautiful South Hams district of South Devon. We do our best to support our local area – we seek to use nearby plant suppliers whenever possible; of course, for all those suppliers located ‘up country’, as we say, we are always at a relatively distant point, in the context of the distribution network ← ‘Princess Diana’ When we first started out, in fact, suppliers, for a smaller nursery, at our relatively
We wanted to find sources for unusual, interesting or new cultivars, to offer our customers – it wasn’t a problem to get hold of as many of ‘Nelly Moser’ or ‘The President’ as we wanted. Not that we have any problem with either of these cultivars –they are both stunningly beautiful when in full bloom – it’s just that they are what
everyone already has, and this didn’t fit in with our desire to try to be unique and original. So that was it – we were hooked. We decided to grow what we wanted to grow, and the rest, as they say, is history. We now have around two hundred different varieties
of clematis growing, at any point in time and the number increases a little, every year. Sometimes we drop one or two, if they really haven’t done as well as we’d hoped, but
‘Alba Luxurians’ ‘Proteus’
they are quickly replaced with other, quality, plants. Of course, our great ambition is to someday breed our own unique, novel clematis; in the meantime we continue to seek out that elusive ‘something special’ for our customers.
‘Why clematis?’ we are often asked. Well, in the words of a popular TV presenter, ‘they are all our favourites; every one of them has something interesting to attract your attention’. As we walk through the nursery, in the mornings, it’s always a joy to see a clematis in flower, for the first time. Because we have so many, there is almost always something in flower; even just before Christmas, two years ago, we had MOONFLEET (‘Evipo046’) still in full bloom, over an arch in the nursery.
By the time we reach September, we have, for better or worse, already decided what we will be growing for next season. By this time, the ‘baby’ plants are establishing and growing on in their pots and we are hoping they get their roots well down, before the days shorten and colder times set in. The bonus, with these younger plants, is that we often get some extra flowers to enjoy later in the season, as they grow away strongly.
Clematisarmandii
Clematisflammula
September is always the time for reflection, as we come to the end of a very busy season. Just as gardeners reflect on how well their garden plants have performed in the year, we reflect also; on how our clematis have performed. Which were our customers’ favourites? What flowered exceptionally well? It is, in the end, ‘all about the flowers’ and in that regard, Clematis certainly deliver.
A big challenge for us, every year, is to find enough area in the nursery to grow everything we want to grow – we never have enough room; every season we search around for gaps we know we don’t really have; it’s always surprising though when, somehow or other, we manage to find just that little bit of extra space.
We try to be as environmentally friendly as possible; to this end, for example, we often supplement our population of ladybirds with new larvae, to help keep aphids under control. On one occasion we inadvertently dispatched a squadron of ladybirds with a plant order. The customer was most surprised when the ladybirds all flew out of the box – although we resisted the temptation to ask her to post them back to us!
Over the years, the wildlife and bird populations in and around the nursery have increased; the robins and wrens particularly enjoy nesting here, wherever they can find a desirable location to set up home. This often involves nesting in, under or between pots of clematis. They are well used to seeing us moving around and about them, though, and take no heed of our comings and goings, as they busy themselves collecting insects to feed their young. We have even been known to close whole sections of the nursery to the public, as the young birds grow from chick to adults, and then eventually fledge.
Due to our location, as well as regular customers we also see many people who are on their holidays, in the nursery. One particular visitor, from Holland, called in one day; before setting off on his travels he had checked on the internet to see if there were any clematis nurseries in the area he was visiting. He spent hours wandering around, with a notepad in hand, thanked us on the way out, and went on his way. A few days later, he reappeared with a list in hand; he’d emailed all his friends and they had all sent requests, by return. We often wonder what Her Majesty’s Customs must have thought, when they watched him departing this land in his motor-home crammed full of clematis plants.
In the late spring, when all of the early large-flowered hybrids are putting on an amazing show, our display area is truly a sight to behold. Visitors have even suggested that our displays are better than some they have seen at Chelsea! While that may not necessarily be completely true, it’s a great compliment that we’ll happily take. Perhaps, one day, we should make the effort to take our plants to the shows?
I often reflect that the questions we get asked about clematis are the same as those asked the world over; whether it is an audience at a local horticultural society talk, an email or a visitor to the nursery, ‘How and when to prune?’ is always top of the list,. It would seem as if clematis culture was some amazing black art…but perhaps it is? One dear fellow popped in one day, rather bemused, explaining that one of the hybrids, that he had bought from us the previous season, had refused to grow. We asked about the general circumstances, how and where it was planted, etc, and then he offered a hint: ‘Should I have hard pruned it in January?’ Perhaps not, we thought, as that January had been one of the coldest, hardest and wettest on record, for some time!
Many people are surprised by the number of varieties that we have growing in the nursery, but we know there are still many more than those we actually have. One day a lady came in and said ‘I am looking for a montana’. ‘Any particular montana?’ we asked; ‘Yes’, she said, ‘I’d like a pink one, the same as the one I have in my garden’. We did manage to find her a pink montana, which met the requirement, but, of course, no guarantees as to whether it would be the same as the one already there!
As the winter beckons, we put the plants to bed, until another season is upon us; we are left to continue our reflections on what has gone before and what is still to come.
Everett Leeds
Flower Variation in Atragene Group Seedlings
Saori Cretin USA peppathepoodleking@yahoo.com
G Growing plants from seed is one of the most rewarding aspects of gardening, and there are many reasons why. The experience of seeing the first flowers, after nursing seedlings for a long while, is both gratifying and highly addictive. Many interesting varieties, rarely found in nurseries, can also be enjoyed by growing from seed. There is also the cost factor – if I had bought ‘full-size’ plants of everything I’ve grown from seed, I would have long since doomed myself to the poorhouse. But the most interesting thing to me is the potential to see new forms of familiar species, and also the novel hybrids that arise from seeds of cultivars; whether because of the diverse flower shapes and colours or even the chance of more vigorous clones of plants that, traditionally, might not have been thought to be generally hardy in my particular climate.
Fig. 1 Clematis‘Albina Plena’ OP seedlings
The Clematis 2014
Fig. 2 Size comparison of C.‘Albina Plena’ open pollinated seedlings. Of the plants I have grown to date, seedlings of C.‘Albina Plena’ have given me the widest diversity in terms of colour and shape that I have so far seen from any single seed batch.
The Clematis 2014
Although I’ve grown most of my plants from seed for some time, now, it took a while for me to become interested in sowing clematis. I had been crossing roses for several years; with roses I can see the first flowers within just a few months, so this was perfect for someone like me, with very little patience.
Fig. 3 One of my ‘Jan Lindmark’ seedlings (left) alongside C. ‘Jan Lindmark’ I had always loved clematis and had been growing them before I began to cross roses, but it was only much later that I tried growing them from seed. The length of time from germination to first flower was a major factor, I must admit. Then, one day, a friend reminded me that ‘as long as you sow something every year, you’ll always have something new the following year’; with that in mind, the wait didn’t seem quite so long, and I decided to give it a try.
In crossing roses I’d had specific goals in mind, but that wasn’t the case when I first started sowing clematis. I simply collected open-pollinated (OP) seeds of the Atragene Group clematis in my garden, as well as some from friends’ gardens and potted them up, to see what I would get. The result was an absolutely amazing variety of new flowers! It is possible to guess at the most likely parentage of many of the new flowers – based on their characteristics and on consideration of where the original plants were positioned, relative to one another in my garden. Some, however, threw me for a loop. Here are some of the more striking results.
Clematis‘Albina Plena’ OP seedlings
OP seedlings of C. ‘Albina Plena’ have given the widest diversity in colour and shape that I have seen so far, from a single seed batch. I was quite surprised to see so many different colours, forms and flower sizes, all from this lovely double white Atragene in
Fig. 4 More white ‘Jan Lindmark’ OP seedlings my garden. I had expected more whites, but in more than a dozen seedlings, only one emerged. In my garden, ‘Albina Plena’ is one of the later-flowering cultivars; some of the earlier ones have already started to fade by the time it blooms. However, the seedlings do show some characteristics of the varieties planted nearby. For example, in Fig. 1, the seedling second from left, bottom row, reminds me of C. ‘Brunette’, which was originally planted adjacent to ‘Albina Plena’. I assume that the bees went first to ‘Brunette’ and then moved on to ‘Albina Plena’. Another example is the pink flower (Fig. 1 top left) –it’s a bit ‘fuzzy’ and has rather thick sepals that could well be inherited from C. fauriei. There is no way to know for certain except by DNA sequencing, obviously, but it is entertaining to try and guess. ‘Albina Plena’ is planted in our ‘Atragene wall’, which has more than two dozen varieties next to one another; the possibilities are therefore pretty much unlimited
Fig. 2 shows a size comparison of ‘Albina Plena’ OP seedlings. Note the variation –doubles, singles, colour differences; and, especially, size differences. The biggest flowers were more than three and a half inches across when fully open.
Clematis‘Jan Lindmark’ OP seedlings
‘Jan Lindmark’ was one of the earliest Atragenes in my garden. I purchased it shortly after we moved into our current property, in the early 2000s, when I was just starting to
The Clematis 2014
discover this clematis group It actually came as C. ‘Blue Bird’; I saw several Atragenes blooming at a local nursery and I fell in love with their delicate, tissuethin sepals; they reminded me of the fine traditional Japanese paper called washi.
Fig. 5 Some ‘Markham’s Pink’ OP seedlings I still remember that I immediately grabbed a flowering pot of (what was labeled) ‘Blue Bird’, along with a lovely single, named C. alpina ‘Pamela Jackman’ (which has since grown to almost thirty feet in height).
After a while I began to doubt the plant was actually ‘Blue Bird’, and some time later I confirmed that my ‘Blue Bird’ was in fact none other than ‘Jan Lindmark’. I have been sowing open-pollinated ‘Jan Lindmark’ seeds for several years and they consistently produce very nice seedlings. Some are close to the parent, with similar colour and delicate, thin sepals, but I’ve also had very pale lavender, and white, flowers. I haven’t had any pink flowers as yet, but I think that if I were to use a pink flower in the cross, I might get some pink flowers with tissue-thin sepals. Or, perhaps, if I were to cross C. ‘Constance’ pollen with ‘Jan Lindmark’, some nice pink flowers might arise.
The Clematis 2014
Crossing C. ‘Constance’ pollen with ‘Jan Lindmark’ will be my very next project. Fig. 3 shows one of my ‘Jan Lindmark’ OP seedlings (left) alongside C. ‘Jan Lindmark’. As you can see, the seedling has many of the characteristics of its parent; I especially love the long, twisted white sepals. Fig. 4 shows some of the other white seedlings from this batch. I have been wondering whether the white colouration has come from C. ‘Albina Plena’. These are some of my favorite seedlings and I will continue to evaluate how they perform, in my garden.
Fig. 6 ‘Purple Spider’ OP seedlings
C. ‘Markham’s Pink’ grows relatively distant from our ‘Atragene wall’; it has outgrown its large eight-foot obelisk and gone twenty feet up into a neighboring oak tree. It is always a prolific bloomer and, since it’s some distance from the other Atragenes, I expected pink flowers from its open-pollinated seeds. However, of more than two dozen seedlings, only one was pink! At first I assumed that I had mislabeled the seedlings, but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed to me as evidence that the genes for ‘pink sepals’ are not as dominant as those for ‘other colours’, in the Atragenes. These are open, hand-pollinated seedlings, so the receipt of pollen from blue and purple Atragenes nearby, courtesy of bees and other insects, is a factor; nevertheless, I was still very surprised that almost all of the seedlings of those lovely pink flowers turned out to be purple and blue. In fact, I’ve found that most seedlings from open-pollinated pink flowers tend to turn out blue or lavender. Of course, the specific identities of the neighbouring plants will affect the result, but, generally speaking, it seems that the genes for ‘pink’ are less dominant than those for blue or purple colouration, in the sepals.
Fig. 7 ‘Propertius’ blooming alongside ‘Purple Spider’ on the same fence
Fig. 5 presents some open-pollinated seedlings of ‘Markham’s Pink’ – most of the other ‘Markham’s Pink’ seedlings that I’ve grown are very similar in colour. Only one plant turned out to be pale pink; I will keep an eye on it to make sure it is not an anomaly.
Clematis‘Purple Spider’ OP seedlings
Fig. 6: I have only sown a few C. ‘Purple Spider’ open-pollinated seeds; I was hoping for some really nice deep purples, like that of the parent. However, since my plant is tangled with C. ‘Propertius’ I had expected that the two would cross pollinate and was interested to see what might result So far, however, I’ve only got two plants to the flowering stage and they bear no resemblance to either ‘Purple Spider’ or ‘Propertius’! Even with OP seeds, I can usually see some traits from neighbouring plants, but these particular ones are rather generic, without any clearly recognisable features. I have more of these seedlings so, hopefully, there’s a chance the others might turn out to be a bit more interesting.
Clematis
‘Propertius’
OP seedlings
When I first saw these seedlings’ buds developing colour, my heart started pounding! ‘Propertius’ is one of my favorites and I was anxious to see how its offspring would turn out. One of the most interesting things about this plant is the off-white picotee (edge) of its sepals; this is sometimes seen in C. koreana and, also, in some of its hybrids, such as ‘Blue Eclipse’. Although the open-pollinated seedlings from ‘Propertius’ didn’t inherit the lovely cream picotee, I can clearly see where the deep grape juice colour came from.
Fig. 8 Open-pollinated seedlings of ‘Propertius’; the bottom image is a side by side comparison of an OP seedling of ‘Propertius’ (left) with ‘Purple Spider’
Fig. 7 shows ‘Propertius’ blooming alongside ‘Purple Spider’ on the same fence; the busy bees must have visited both, and done their work.
Fig. 8 shows open-pollinated seedlings of ‘Propertius’; in the bottom picture, an OP seedling of ‘Propertius’ (left) closely resembles one of the seedlings of ‘Purple Spider’.
Clematis‘Cerise Double’ seedlings
In Fig. 9 the plants are from seed that I received from one of my friends as C. ‘Cerise Double’; they turned out to be some of the more interesting Atragene seedlings I’ve raised. I don’t know the details of the pollen parent, but one of the seedlings (on the right) produces very unusual, interesting sepals. I have been observing this seedling for two years so far, and it consistently flowers in this form. I know that the friend who gave me this seed also grows a special form of Clematis ochotensis found only in Hokkaido, in Japan, which resembles this flower. My seedling could therefore be a result of cross pollination (by an insect) with that plant, prior to the formation of the seed I acquired.
Clematiskoreana-hybrid seedlings
I love C. koreana and its hybrids. Whenever I get seed, I sow it immediately, just to see what I’ll get. The koreanas have such a wide range of colours; I frequently cross them with other Atragenes. Here (Fig. 10) are some of the seedlings I’m growing right now –
Fig. 11: Most of my seedlings are from open-pollinated seed. When I started out, I didn’t have any specific hybridization goals in mind; I was just doing it casually, to see what I might end up with. I also crossed some plants randomly, just because the two parents happened to be ready for pollination simultaneously. So, I don’t recall what I was aiming at, if anything, with this cross. I am, however, very happy to see that this seedling inherited the lovely deep colour of its pollen parent –especially as I lost C. ‘Brunette’ shortly after.
Fig. 10 Clematis koreanahybrid seedlings; some really attractive plants came from this particular batch
C. ‘Jan Lindmark’ × C. ‘Propertius’ seedlings
Fig. 12: This is another cross I did some time ago. In this cross I was looking for flowers with the lovely cream
12B Seedlings of ‘Jan Lindmark’ × Clematis‘Propertius’
Fig. 13A Some Clematisfusijamanaseedlings picotee that ‘Propertius’ has. The results were a bit different from what I was hoping for, but I did get some pretty cream and white seedlings, along with some interesting pink flowers. For some unknown reason, C. ‘Jan Lindmark’ seedlings have given me lots of white and cream coloured flowers; I had assumed it was because ‘Jan Lindmark’ and ‘Propertius’ are planted next each other, however, even with careful hand-pollination,
Fig.
Fig. 13B More seedlings of Clematisfusijamana and subsequent isolation, a high proportion of ‘Jan Lindmark’ seedlings still bear white and cream flowers. Sometimes you can guess what may result, but other times you are completely surprised – one of the reasons why growing from seed is so very rewarding.
Fig. 14 Other flowers from the same batch of Clematis fusijamana seedlings
Clematis fusijamana seedlings
Fig. 13: these are the favorites of my current crop of seedlings. Unfortunately, they are not from my crosses or even from my own seed. A friend gave me the seeds a while ago and I have been thrilled by the results. They were just labeled as Clematis alpina var. fusijamana – I’m not sure what, if anything, they were crossed with, but the results have been rather striking. Yet other seedlings from this same batch of seed have turned out as in Fig 14.
So far, the bees seem to be much better at this little game than me but I am certainly enjoying raising new clematis plants from seed. To me, it’s like playing a lottery every day – one you never lose!
Hybrids of Clematis tibetana ‘Black Tibet’
Aidan Armitage
UK aidanarmitage@btinternet.com
IIn 2008 it happened that I had two particular clematis growing right next to each other, in my garden: the first was Clematis ‘Hatherly’, a hybrid of the Tangutica Group that I had acquired from Barry Fretwell's nursery; the other was Clematis tibetana ‘Black Tibet’.
In due course I decided to germinate some of the seeds from ‘Black Tibet’, because I was interested to see if any colour variations might appear in the offspring The seedlings flowered for the first time in July 2009. I was very surprised to see that all the flowers displayed a heavy red-purple mottling, on a yellowish gold background. This led me to suspect, initially, perhaps Clematis ‘Hatherly’ could have been the pollen parent – it was, after all, the nearest neighbour to ‘Black Tibet’ and was the only other clematis flowering at the same time as ‘Black Tibet’. All the seedlings displayed floral characteristics common to both parents.
Above and left, ‘Black Tibet’ I planted the two best specimens in my garden. Both of them flower very freely; the first has lighter coloured, intricately speckled blooms formed of smaller, thinner tepals; the sibling has arresting, larger flowers with thicker, darker tepals.
The darker flowered plant is a vigorous deciduous climber with dark red-purple stems growing to about 4 metres. The filigree pinnate glaucous leaves are of a lovely shade of grey-green, with 5-7 leaflets, the leaflets lanceolate to elliptic, generally toothed and notched. At first the flowers are bell shaped but after a while the sepals push away from
Above and following images: the darker coloured blooms the boss, becoming openly campanulate and varying in size from 3-6cms across. They are held aloft on long stalks, up to 10-14cm in length. The flowers always have four sepals; each has a thickly ridged outer surface, very heavily flushed with red-purple dapples and speckles, laid over a highly contrasting uniform lemon yellow background; the interiors of the sepals are faintly but suffusely spotted. The stunning filaments are of a dashing dark purple, with completely contrasting pure white anthers. The styles are a
mass of yellow; as soon as the flower has been fertilised, they begin to elongate rapidly and the silky fruits soon begin to develop. Both plants are fully hardy and have survived temperatures of -16°C, here in the north of England.
The two main characteristics of the flowers – widely spreading and with an underlying lemon yellow colour – are typical of Clematis ‘Hatherly’, but not of Clematis tibetana ‘Black Tibet’. However, the overall colouring, stamen characters and the appearance of the styles are clearly reminiscent of ‘Black Tibet’, the mother plant. For these reasons, I have concluded that the seedlings are almost certainly the result of a random hybridisation between these two adjacent plants.
The flowers of these hybrid plants have another unusual and endearing characteristic – they close tightly back up, at night, opening again at daybreak the following morning. I have never seen this before with any other clematis! Sadly, though, the flowers do not last a long time – the sepals soon fall away, presumably once fertilisation has been achieved. The flowers function efficiently enough to enable them to
produce masses of large, silvery seed heads, although these are not as impressive as those of Clematis ‘Hatherly’
I think the colour variations of Clematis tibetana subsp. vernayi in the wild must be innumerable, given the possibility of open pollination with other local members of the Tangutica Group
Sadly, I lost my ‘Black Tibet’ a few years ago, when I tried to move it to a better position; it is proving difficult to obtain a replacement.
More new Large-Flowered Hybrids – Yes or No?
Ton Hannink Netherlands ton@hanninkton.nl
AAfter years of giving lectures about Clematis to garden societies, I have had lots of feedback about how clematis perform in the garden. The most important issue is that people say they just can't keep Large-Flowered Hybrid (LFH) clematis alive in the garden, even for shortish periods – they often die within one to three years…. ‘so clematis is a bad plant in the garden’
In 2010, when we visited various gardens during the International Clematis Society trip to Portland, I saw in some of the gardens several examples of one of the latest red LFH cultivars, and, in every instance, I could see that the plant had wilt. People see beautiful clematis at flower shows and spend lots of money buying plants... and then get such a result. It’s displeasing to hear about, and does nothing to help the popularity of the genus. Several things have crossed my mind:
Isn’t this our own fault?
Do we really always need flowers to be as fully double as possible?
Do we actually use healthy plant material for crossings?
Do we trial the selected new plants sufficiently?
Do we strive overly to get clematis as ‘low growing’ as possible?
Why do we keep using the same ‘gene pool’?
Why don’t we use more ‘wild’ species plants for crossings?
Isn’t this our own fault?
Yes – I believe this is our own fault: in the quest for ornamentation we try to develop new clematis with flowers as double as possible and, also, with stems as low growing as possible, without giving sufficient thought to the constitution/strength of the plants. When I started making crossings with LFHs, I bought several new clematis cultivars and these plants were tried out in the greenhouse under the same conditions as my ‘wild’ clematis plants (other clematis species). After three years, not one of the new plants was still alive, but my ‘wild’ plants, under the exact same conditions, were still fully healthy.
I concluded that some of the newer cultivars have not really been adequately trialled for resistance and, particularly, for hardiness.
Clematishancockianaflowering sequence
I therefore decided to continue my breeding programme using smaller-flowering clematis and other especially healthy-growing clematis. In the meantime, I began searching around for new, ‘wild’ clematis species, and in due course I was successful – I eventually managed to obtain a range of ‘wild’ clematis species plants from China. I was soon able to incorporate these robust and healthy types into my breeding project, and start to cross other plants with them. The factors of importance to me were as follows:
Does the plant grow to a normal clematis plant size?
Do the flowers produce enough pollen? I say this because I have observed that ‘wild’ C. lanuginosa and C. patens var. tientaiensis make lots of pollen, yet many of the current, newer hybrids only produce very sparse amounts (degeneration?).
Plants that can develop wilt are completely excluded from my programme. New plants with double flowers must survive for at least three full years, in my greenhouse, under demanding conditions.
Do we trial the plants sufficiently?
Trialling clematis is not a straightforward task: firstly, you need a lot of room; secondly, it takes several years to see how plants react to seasons of different weather conditions. I test some of my plants out in my greenhouse – in summer the temperature can rise to as high as 40-50°C and, under these conditions, the leaves burn and the weaker or more susceptible plants develop wilt, in my experience. All my crossings of healthy LFH × lanuginosa/patens/hancockiana/cadmia/xiangguiensis/courtoisii (all ‘wild’ species) or lanuginosa/patens/hancockiana/cadmia/xiangguiensis/courtoisii (all ‘wild’ species) × healthy LFH do not get wilt!
Recently I was chatting with a couple of clematis nursery owners, one of whom said ‘clematis are grown under the best possible conditions in the nursery, with adequate fertiliser and water; after that, they get planted out in gardens, under completely different conditions, and soon after that, some of them start to suffer’. This of course is true –you almost never see wilt at a nursery, and nursery people are surprised when they see it affecting plants, once they have been put out in the garden.
Some of the healthiest and sturdiest plants are those bred in Eastern Europe. These are raised and selected under generally more extreme conditions than in other countries. Why do we use the same ‘gene pool' over and over, with too few ‘wild’ plants’ genes introduced into crossings?
Let’s say we are looking for new clematis cultivars with double flowers. It is quite easy and relatively quick to get new doubles if you use known double-flower producing plants as parents. You may then use the resultant new plants for further crosses with other known double clematis etc. This amounts to just using the same ‘gene pool’ over and over, without introducing any new genes. If, however, we introduce other healthy single LFH plants or, better still, ‘wild’ species, with different genetic characteristics, then it is harder and takes more time to produce new double plants, but the plants that do eventually emerge are stronger, and moreover, not prone to the usual culture problems. What is best – lots more new double flowering clematis with the same old problems, or fewer, but far stronger and sturdier, new plants?
Why don’t we use ‘wild’ plants in crossings? It is not easy to obtain new ‘wild’ clematis plants, from, say, China – for a start, you firstly need to locate and approach the right people, then culture good relations and contacts. This demands a lot of time and effort and can cost some money.
I know now that most of the types of plants I’m interested in are in China, being grown by hobbyists. Such plants are never (or only very rarely) sent out to people in Europe or the USA The general perception is that most people will ask for new plants to be sent to them but won’t try and return the favour in any way. I was able to obtain my plants from China because I was eager to reciprocate with plant material, and information of interest to my Chinese friends. Now, some of my plants are being used in clematis breeding in China. I’ve worked in the same way with individuals in Hong Kong. The reward? I now have the real, genuine Clematis meyeniana and Clematis crassifolia.
What is important for the future?
Better selection methods for new hybrids/cultivars?
Gradual general improvements in disease resistance in the future?
Better plants to maintain gardeners’ enthusiasm and interest in Clematis?
Long term thinking, instead of short, in breeding programmes?
New Clematis – From Germination to First Flowers: Basic Notes for Amateurs
Brian Collingwood UK bcollingwood@ntlworld.com
Y
YOU TOO can raise your own unique clematis plants from seed! And YOU will be the first person to see the brand new, unique, beautiful flowers! Having watched them develop from minuscule seedlings, and then go through the young plant stages, it is totally thrilling when the first ever tiny flower buds can be glimpsed. As the buds develop toward their eventual opening, the anticipation steadily mounts and the excitement is, every step of the way to the climax, completely spellbinding!
Which clematis do these notes apply to? In terms of raising new plants from germination to the first flowers stage, they will hold good for most types of clematis –certainly, all large-flowered types, all Viticellas, Alpinas, Macropetalas, Atragenes, many Integrifiolia-types, Montanas, Cirrhosas, Flammulas, Texensis, Tangutica and Viorna Groups, plus many species. This is because the goal, for each and every plant, is identical – to see the first flowers (followed by the second, next year). In this method, all plants, whatever their type, are permitted just two vines: one for the first flowers, and one for ‘insurance’, just in case a problem arises with the first vine. If, in subsequent seasons, you want to grow them on, into garden plants, differences in treatment will come into play. But up to the point of producing the first flowers, all plants are treated similarly. Why? Because it works well in all cases and produces superbly healthy, vigorous plants which are anxious to produce their first blooms. Some minor modifications may be necessary here and there, with particular plants, for example, when the growth pattern or form of the plant happens to be slightly different – but such things are common sense and can be taken care of as they arise, during your day to day ‘gardening’ of the young plants. The vast majority of plants raised from seed will just need staking at the appropriate time, tying-in regularly and kept free of pests, to allow them to give of their very best.
The notes don’t seek to deal with every possible point, in detail – just the most important principles. You will learn all the rest naturally, as you go along, raising plants.
Why grow new clematis plants?
Firstly, there is the pure enjoyment of watching your new baby seedlings develop through all the juvenile stages leading to adult plants. You will observe their graduation from seedlings into young plants proper, then the development of foliage, and form; and
then, one fine day, you notice flower buds being produced. The thrill and excitement of seeing the buds for the first time is something special. You have succeeded! You will now witness every detail of the climax. The mature flower buds begin to open and, soon, all their secrets will be revealed. There is an outside chance that the flowers may be different from what has been seen before. Whether they are or they aren’t, you can choose to name your own plant, if you wish (although in most cases it might not be appropriate to register it with the Seeds in pot, pot in bag Registrar). Even if your new plant is similar to a plant already in existence – which it often may be – possibly it might be a more vigorous, or more floriferous, plant than the one currently available? Who knows? You won’t be able to gauge such matters with exactness until you have seen a plant perform over the course of a few years. But, what a thrilling journey of anticipation, discovery and understanding, with every single plant! If you are growing pure species seed (or you think you are), you may get a particularly fine form, or specimen, a very rewarding outcome. You can send your clematis friends copies of your clone, in due course. Every seed from a hybrid will produce a new hybrid. With hybrids this means there are endless possible outcomes, and you will never know just what you are going to get, until that magic moment when the first flowers open! Whatever plants you grow, the excitement of the first flowers is the big thrill! I can guarantee that you will, in the last days leading up to opening, be completely captivated and glued to them. You will take a lot of photos and you will be very much motivated to show your brand new, unique clematis flowers to local gardening friends. They too will be enthralled – especially if you warn them a few days in advance, and then invite them round to see the wonderful new flowers as they open! Soon they will be sowing seeds themselves – but warn them: it can become highly addictive!
Preliminaries
The stages: seed→germination→newborn seedling→established seedling→very young plant→established plant→buds→flowers. Seeds can be obtained from a variety of sources: firstly, your own garden clematis plants (or from plants at your local garden centre, for that matter – but make sure you ask the garden centre manager/owner first!) The British and International Clematis Societies both run excellent Seed Exchanges: many Society members gather seed from their garden or greenhouse plants each year and send it to a central receiving point, where it is cleaned, sorted and pooled with other members’ collections. The seed lots are then divided into small quantities in individual packets and can be bought by interested members or amateur raisers. I personally think the BCS Seed Exchange is the jewel in the crown. There are also many other sources, if you keep your eyes peeled: collections
made in the wild, from which seed can be bought; other amateur growers; through swapping seeds or obtaining seed gifts after personal correspondence. It is becoming everyday to see people on various clematis internet forums discussing and regularly exchanging seeds.
Every time I meet someone who raises new plants I find that they employ slightly different methods. Raisers evolve a preferred method, over time, as experience is gained. The same goes for details of medium, pot size, pot storage, etc. Many people now prefer the newer ‘baggie’ method, where seed is germinated in moist vermiculite or perlite, first,
Germinations
Through a hand lens
and then transplanted into pots, post germination. As well as being reliable and efficient, this method can, in some cases, also shorten germination times significantly, if this is desired for any reason (fantastic if you are a hybridiser and you want seedlings from a particular cross as soon as possible). Whatever, the general method below will eventually work for virtually all seed types, if you want to let nature run its course, and if you are not in a particular hurry.
When sowing, aim to set a range of seed types, over a period of time. Try to sow seeds at regular intervals. If you have some seed that germinates rapidly you can have plants progressing steadily toward first flowers, during the first season, even while you are still waiting for those that take longer to come. If you sow regularly, then once the first six months has passed, or the first winter ended, germinations will be occurring on an ongoing basis. From that point on, you will always be very busy with young plants, and certainly not needing to speed anything along.
When the seedlings appear, the excitement begins. Seedlings appear If you have a range of various clematis seedlings on the go, over time you will notice differences between them, and, later, you will get to recognise the form of development of particular groups or types of plant. You will soon be acquainted with the structure of each tiny plant and how they should look – any problems that crop up can easily be immediately spotted, and dealt with straight away. If you have any failures don’t let it discourage you at all! Once the seedlings are past the initial stages, you are over the biggest hurdles and on the home run, as, with good attention and a few minutes’ daily care, the plants will, from then, largely look after themselves. So long as you have good, hygienic raising conditions, success will follow. Before long, you will be watching the first flowers form. By the time this happens, you will find yourself looking forward with anticipation (and great confidence) to the excitement of raising many more new plants.
Medium for Sowing Seed
I don’t think there is a particular ‘best’ mix for raising seedlings – everyone I’ve ever spoken with seems to have their own version. My preferred mix is ‘any general compost combined with a little peat and about 15% fine gravel’. There are reasons for this. I find that the grit is beneficial for strong root growth. I find that the nutrient content of general compost is quite adequate and no feeding of the pots is usually required – as the plants are repotted from 4” pots to 1 litre pots they get a fresh supply of nutrient for the coming period; then the same thing happens again when the plants are moved into 2 litres pots. If the natural open ground, exposed to all the possible perils of lack of water, too much water, too hot, in the shade, low nutrient conditions, water logging, slugs, insects etc is enough to allow seedlings to germinate – and it is, frequently – then most clean commercial compost mixes should prove ok, even if just to start the seeds in. A couple of years ago, a friend (thank you, Iris Clarke) sent me handfuls of seedlings in the post – they had emerged directly through her lawn, (yes, her lawn) the seeds having been shed from an established Viticella cultivar in the adjoining border, a year or two prior!
Excitement – yet more seedlings appear, dotted all around the pot!
I place around a dozen or so seeds in each 4” pot and I put a layer of fine gravel on the surface of the medium. I find this helps keep conditions perfect, within the bag, over long periods of storage. I enclose each pot in its own top-sealing plastic bag; six pots fill one tray, and the trays are stored beneath the greenhouse staging, covered with cardboard. The pots are always covered over, so most germinations occur in the dark or near dark. Depending on the type, age and condition of seed, germination will take anything from 30-100 or more days for some thin-walled smaller type seeds (some meclatis, some alpina, some macropetala, some species) or from perhaps 180 to 500 days for others – but the majority will come well before 365 days have passed, while the laggards may appear over periods of two or more years. Thetime,mydearfriend,is goingtopassanyway . So, just get them sown, and forget about them for a while - you have now completed the most important step in the whole process.
You may get some surprise quick germinations, so check all the seeds weekly. You can alter the frequency of scrutiny as you see fit, depending on how often germinations are occurring.
Seedling emergence
At germination a seed usually produces a tiny needle-like growth, which penetrates the surface of the medium to poke out into the light. The shoots are very small so you may initially miss them, but as soon as you have seen one, you won’t miss any others because you’ll recognise the form instantly. Soon they produce the first green ‘leaves’ and are then very obvious. Some clematis start differently – with a pair of leaves pushing up and through the surface and into the light. You will spot them immediately. I don’t propose to go into the technical aspects of germination here so if you wish to read more details,
consult Magnus Johnson’s The Genus Clematis. The fact is, for most clematis, the first thing you will normally see will be a small stem, atop of which there will be a pair (or several pairs) of small leaves; or, just a pair of leaves, with their stems poking up through the surface of the medium.
As soon as the first green growth is in existence, seedlings can begin gathering light energy via the process of photosynthesis. The light captured by the green chlorophyll supplies the young plant with the energy it needs to synthesize sugars and other carbon compounds, the carbon atoms being derived from carbon dioxide gas absorbed from the atmosphere. Once made, such compounds are translocated to where needed, or stored.
At this stage the seedlings are miniscule and fragile; nevertheless, if you wish, you can wash them down so they are completely free of medium, to examine them, without harming them – but be very careful and try to manipulate them mainly by holding the leaves. You don’t want to be touching the stems, at all, if avoidable and, where the root is still very insubstantial, don’t compress or bend it in the slightest.
A new seedling is born with everything needed for survival and growth. Many millions of years of evolution have gone into fine-tuning the mechanisms that work to move it through to adulthood, when it can finally reproduce and form seeds, to provide the next generation. The tiny root draws water (and dissolved minerals – nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium compounds, other elements) from the surrounding medium; the aerial portions engage in photosynthesis, providing energy and carbon compounds for life and growth. Given the raw materials, the active region of the stem tip will produce pair after pair of new leaves. Once a set is fully formed, the tip extends further, taking it physically on, before the next pair is formed. As elongation of the vine continues, each set of new leaves is gradually left further and further behind from the advancing vine tip.
Young seedling stage
Once the seedlings have germinated, bring them into the light (but don’t ever leave them in direct sunshine – it may well kill them). Allow them to progress at their own rate for a good few weeks in the original container. If the germinations occurred toward the end of
the year, leave them alone, in the germination pot, until spring comes around. If they germinate anytime after winter, they can be allowed to grow on until they are large enough to be transplanted into their own individual 4” pots. They may not look it but they are tough little things and won’t need too much cotton wool. There are just three or four things to be careful about. First, don’t ever over-water them. Keep the medium just moist, never wet. But don’t let it dry out too much either. Give only small quantities of water, when required. Second, you might add into the water
a weak systemic anti-fungal, at an early stage – but only a weak solution. They may not need it, at the time, but as a preventative it is a reasonable strategy. Keep a systemic insecticide handy, as well, just in case. Don’t ever allow any pests to get established: give
plants close scrutiny each day, so you can act immediately, should you notice any insects, or other nasties. React without delay – that is key. Don’t ever use strong concentrations of chemicals. You are only reinforcing the plant’s own capabilities. Occasionally, some seedlings may need a specific remedy for a specific problem, but this should be rare, if your growing conditions are kept clean and tidy. If things keep going wrong, be on the lookout for something more generally amiss with your culture/cleanliness conditions.
Once seedlings have got through the first couple of weeks, they quickly change their form and appearance. They become more physically established: the initial green shoots turn brown and become more woody, and as they continue in growth, the tiny leaves begin to be able to wrap themselves firmly around any supports or stakes. Once several sets of leaves have been produced, the seedlings take on a more stocky look and they will soon be ready for an initial pruning. The young plants strengthen their grip on life and rapidly progress towards the ‘adolescent’ stages, leaving ‘seedling form’ behind, forever.
Transplanting into individual pots
Take the pot of germinations and slightly deform it (assuming you use plastic pots!) by hand, then invert it and tap the bottom so that the entire contents of the pot come out in one lump, onto the working bench. You can now break the mass into several pieces, each with a few seedlings embedded. Gently work them free of each other but don’t remove any medium from the root, unless it falls away naturally. Handle the seedlings carefully – either by manipulating the lump of medium within which it is embedded, or by the leaves, if not; then pop each one gently into a prepared pot, half filled with new medium. As you do this, carefully add more compost and tap the pot on the bench or
The Clematis 2014
ground to anchor the seedling in place, making sure that its final position is near the centre of the new pot. Give the pot enough water to moisten the medium – no more.
Out of sight, the tiny root soon begins to send several long extensions down into the medium and rapidly becomes aware the volume of the container, in which it is growing. These growths ramify and branch and as they do so the total volume of root material increases very rapidly. At a certain point, the root achieves a volume massive enough not just to meet, but to surpass, the needs of the aerial parts, in terms of water supply. Near the top of the root mass, discrete areas of root gradually begin to thicken and take on a more woody character and colour; from these forming ‘crown’ areas just below the surface, new growth buds are formed. Some of these will immediately expand and begin to produce extension growths – vines – whereas others will remain dormant, for the time being. Before too long, the seedling’s roots will come to occupy most of the volume
of the pot; some will pop themselves out through the drainage holes at the base, to take a look around their growing home, and watch you at work. At this point you know a plant is nearly ready to be moved to the next container size up.
Dealing with seedlings
When seedlings are still just small, my aim is to exert controls which will massively influence the future development of each plant. A seedling usually (mostly but not always) produces one single shoot. Once it has three of four sets of leaves, prune it. It will gather itself quietly and then react strongly to the pruning, after a pause of about two or three days, sometimes less. The pruned vine will develop two new buds, from the axils below. These tiny little plants produce buds, even on seedlings, which are huge in comparison to the vine material carrying them. The buds will soon break and begin to produce extension growths. One stem will be replaced by a pair. If young seedlings are pruned in this way and then kept restricted to two vines, the plants go on in due course to carry just the perfect volume of aerial growth needed. It is easy to control the foliage by staking and the plants look full, and beautifully green and healthy.
Yes, once pruned, plants tick over for a few days and then come back with full gusto. The whole plant gears up a level, in terms of physique. The baby plant takes stock of its situation, then accelerates its metabolism to a level needed to support two growing vines, and the future foliage. Underneath, the root begins to proliferate and bulk up rapidly, to quickly attain the mass necessary to supply water to twice as much vine and foliage volume as before. This in turn means that much more photosynthesis can take place, bringing an increased supply of energy and the compounds within which it is stored. The whole plant rapidly augments in bulk, the transport system of the small plant becoming massively ramped up in size, housed in a sturdier, more substantial framework.
Overwintering and coming back after winter
Coming back after winter
As the days go by, you notice the change, and soon realise that you have watched the seedlings grow out of their infancy and develop into a small plants proper.
The aim of ongoing pruning is to restrict the growth to two vines: a plant senses how it is being handled and will fill itself out accordingly. If any shoots are produced from the ground, remove them all, keeping the plant to just two shoots. The plant will produce just the right amount of foliage. Never allow a tangled mass of vines to develop – unless you restrict the foliage volume, you will give yourself unnecessary difficulties and much more work, for no gain. The plant knows exactly the correct balance between supply of nutrients, root volume, aerial mass and potential for flowers. As the foliage is produced, the plant positions each leaf so as to gain good overall exposure to the impinging light.
Spring arrives and the plants quickly get going
When repotting from the first pot to the second size pot, loosen the mass and invert, tap the base and knock out the whole mass. Place the full mass into the next size pot, already half filled with compost, then make up the volume of the pot again with new medium,
The Clematis 2014
A couple of months later - one of the plants from this batch of seeds, in its 2 litres pot
keeping the main stems positioned near the centre of the pot. Usually, any stakes already inserted in the mass will stay in place, which is very convenient. You can set the plant slightly deeper this time: top it off with a layer of fine gravel and give it a little drink, just to moisten the medium, and merge the new medium into the old. Keep plants out of direct sunlight for a few days, until they look happy and settled, in their new living space.
A plant soon senses that it has been rehoused, and reacts with enthusiasm as soon as it detects the obvious presence of new medium and increased living space. As the root expands into the new volume, the aerial parts grow away, with vigour and vitality.
Another thing about restricting plants to two vines is that there is always plenty of nutrient in the pot. If you let a plant grow away on too many vines, the medium in the pot is soon exhausted. But if you keep the plant in check on just two vines, the demand on the medium is much less. As the plant is repotted successively from 4” to 1 litre and then 2 litres, it always finds abundant nutrients available, and this means it can grow on as fast as possible, with all its needs completely satisfied at every moment.
The result is a completely happy and vigorous plant with just the right amount of vine and foliage. Such a plant will give its all, when the time comes to produce flower buds. A plant with limited vine material knows that every flower it can produce is vital. Where a plant has a strong, healthy root system, and plentiful nutrient and water supplies, each flower is opened in immaculate, pristine condition; you will revel in seeing the blooms unfurl, and transform into magnificent beauties, one after the other.
Staking and growing on
Once seedlings are growing away, you will need to stake them. I use 18” and 24” ‘flower stick’ stakes, which are perfect for the job. I tie vines in with a loop of plastic-covered
wire – cut with sharp scissors from a roll, as required. It is a quick and easy job, once you have got the hang of it. When the vine has reached the top of the stake, push in a second stake, three or four inches away, and allow enough growth so the advancing top three or four inches can be tied back down to the second stake. Then, as the vine extends further, direct it down the stake, tying it in, at intervals. When the tip is near the bottom of the second stake, tie it back onto the first stake, and direct it back up again! You will find that the plant is very happy being dealt with, this way. The foliage will find its own best position to collect light. As well as keeping everything neat, tidy and compact, plenty of air can circulate, so the plants stay healthy, vigorous and pest free. And since they are compact and under control at all times, you can raise a large number of plants in a small area, without any difficulty at all.
As you go about your daily care of the plants, prune off any new growths that appear, so that the plant is always kept to two vines only; some new growths will appear from the subsoil, and others, from lower or, occasionally, upper leaf axil. Take them off as soon as they appear. Use sharp, clean scissors; always keep your scissors clean and from time to time wash them properly or sterilize them with heat. You do not want to be injecting last week’s old plant matter into today’s healthy vine – a sure way to spread problems. If you wish, allow a couple of new growths to make a couple of nodes, and then, when they reach the level of semi-ripeness – just turning from soft and green to harder and darker – snip them off and push them down the side of the pot, with a little
Almost there water, to bed them in. You will find that such tiny cuttings often root quite easily: you can let them develop, in the parent pot, keeping them well pruned. It is always a good idea to maintain a clone of your material, just in case disaster strikes the main plant. From time to time you’ll raise plants that you really want copies of, without delay.
Advancing the plants towards flowering
Once plants have gone from 4” pots to 1 litre, then 2 litres, they have left adolescence behind and are attaining early adulthood. They will want to soon fulfill the imperative of reproduction – that’s what it’s all been leading to. The root, the actual plant proper, sits unseen, quietly coordinating everything. The root is king – it is the heart, soul and brain of the plant. It is the subterranean overlord, which determines what the aerial parts do, how they go about it, and how they look: the form and colour of the flowers…. just some caprices of the master body, which co-ordinates all, from below the surface.
Plants have inbuilt clocks and mechanisms which ensure that the timing of events –producing flowers – is undertaken at exactly the right time, or as soon as possible, if it happens to occur late in the season. They measure day length and temperature to the minute and degree. Some plants will take two seasons to flower (or flower well); others can make it in one, and a few will make you wait three years. But with good practice you should find that young plants will try to flower in the first season, if they can grasp enough development time; failing this, they will definitely be ready to flower in season number two. ‘Year one’ flowers may not always show the final, ‘year two’ finished form. A silent internal trigger fires, and the buds suddenly appear. You are able to observe all the details, as the transformation slowly proceeds, inside the sepal exteriors. Like the veritable ‘butterfly in a cocoon’, what is happening inside, and the final result, remain a completely mystery until the moment of truth. At a given point, it becomes obvious that the plant is now almost ready, and the buds are awaiting just the final signal to unfurl.
The Clematis 2014
Another plant from this seed batch: two vines on three stakes
First Flowers
Any young plant may throw out a single first flower, if it has enough development time, in its first season. As you become practiced and more proficient, you will find you can achieve this more and more often. But, generally, plants will flower for the first time in year two. They will always flower at least once, and sometimes, under glass at least, they may flower twice or, even, tend more towards continuous flowering. If they don’t flower in the first season, cut them down between winter and spring and they will then come back from the base – remember to allow just two vines: one for flowers, one for insurance – and stake them, and tie them in, as they grow away.
When you get to be a little more experienced, you can allow some of the old wood from last year to persist over the winter. Why? You might not be able to see them when they are looking dark and dead in dank winter, but on the right plants (especially largeflowered hybrids) some of these ‘old’ vines may carry buds that are able to form flowers, immediately after the onset of spring. The buds suddenly become visible and swollen, and before you know it, huge flowers are developing on short growths, directly from the axils of the old vines. You don’t have to try this, it is not a necessity, but it does allow you to understand a little more about the nature of any specific plant. This can be a fascinating guide to the eventual pruning group of the mature plant. Where this happens, the plants will still almost certainly flower again, later, on this season’s new wood.
If the plants were pruned to the ground, between last winter and the coming spring, then, when they re-emerge in spring, they will put vigorous shoots up into the light, and then slowly develop the earliest foliage. They may begin to produce some extension growth but generally they will linger somewhat, until they are convinced that the days really are gradually getting longer. At a given point after this, they become fully committed to the new season: an invisible switch is thrown and they suddenly explode
into extension growth, and, thereafter, staking and tieing-in will become a daily necessity. You will notice the medium in the pots now begins to need slightly more frequent wetting, as water is extracted and pushed into the plant by the roots. You can always tell when metabolism is getting properly going again – the plant will take on more water and the change is evident more or less straight away
Once the plants are growing vigorously again, you are rapidly nearing the moment of truth. Many plants will produce fat flower buds almost immediately. Others will set off into growth and may fill a couple of stakes, and half the season, before the buds suddenly begin to appear. Once they do appear, the excitement begins to mount. As you watch their development, the anticipation increases dramatically! Personally, being a complete addict, I photograph the plants from germination all the way through to flowering, however, for normal people, now is the time to get the camera ready.
The buds begin to enlarge and the separate sepals become clearly visible. They enlarge, by degree, as the days tick by. The sepal outers – the only parts of the flower
The Clematis 2014 that you can see – may develop additional structure, markings or light veining or perhaps appear to change their texture somewhat. As the days pass, you observe the gradual transformation. At a given moment it becomes obvious that the internal machinations are almost completed; in some plants the main flower stalk now rapidly elongates to its favoured length, angle and distance away from the foliage. Now comes your reward.
I don’t know what it is about clematis, but most (if not all) of the new flowers you will see, will be beautiful! You don’t know the colour yet, or the shape, or the nuances –such as any central bar, ribs, folds, frills, rills etc. You have no idea of stamen shape, length, form and colour. The pistil is still invisible, the colour and form unknown.
Now, we are at the ultimate threshold. The immaculate, exciting buds stand poised, waiting for the final stimulus. At a certain moment the tips of the sepals break apart and, like Velcro strips, they slowly tear away from one another and begin to unfurl, then slowly flatten out and expand to their full area. After all that has gone before, the colour of the sepals can finally be seen…revelation! The beautiful flower is finally open; during the next 24-48 hours it gradually matures to its radiant climax. It is such an exhilarating and thrilling event, which never loses its power to move and inspire you, no matter how many plants you raise to first flowers!
Afterthought
Joy of joys! Yes, YOU have succeeded in raising brand new, beautiful unique clematis flowers! You snap numerous digital photographs, morning, noon and even some at night! Your clematis friends, some of whom are thousands of miles away, in another time zone and half way across the world, can see the images instantly, by email or on the web, and can fully share the joy, even as the drama is actually unfolding in your greenhouse.
It only remains to say that if you grow a reasonable number of plants, flower production will sometimes occur on several different plants at the same time; the more plants you have, the more will be coming into flower at any given point. Then you might get a lull, then another batch coming into flower, etc. The pattern will depend on the mix of the types of plants you are growing, and their ages. If you are raising more than a certain number, you’ll have times when flowers seem to be being produced in waves. If the excitement of one single new plant coming to flower is rather thrilling (and it very much is), then five, ten, twenty, fifty or, dare I say, a hundred of them doing it, over the course of a few weeks or months, is something you will never, ever forget.
Old Friends, Where Are You Now?
Dr Kalani Seymour UK TPP@plantheritage.org.uk
IIwent to a college reunion last weekend. Enclosed in the invitation was a list of compatriots who had left their last known addresses: not too far from my ‘day job’ of working out which cultivars are rare, or, worse, have left their last known address. Plant Heritage’s Threatened Plants Project was started in 2009 to find out what had once been grown in British or Irish horticulture, but has become rare enough to be considered ‘Threatened in Cultivation’. For example, a plant with only one supplier listed in the RHS Plant Finder for the past five years, as well as a plant no longer available, would be ‘Threatened Plants’. Plants new to Plant Finder in 2005 and onwards are excluded. We have recently compiled a draft ‘Threatened’ list for Clematis – most of which names have no known current address. Have you seen any of them recently?
The story in numbers:
2,316 clematis taxa listed in the RHS horticultural database, which includes species as well as cultivars (now at http://apps.rhs.org.uk/horticulturaldatabase); 1,153 clematis cultivars known by us to have been grown in the UK & Ireland (there will be more); 413 ‘Threatened in Cultivation’ (for example, no longer listed in the Plant Finder); 47 threatened plants have been found across five National Plant Collections®; 24 of these are not known growing anywhere else. All are ‘Endangered in Cultivation’; 36 are recorded as growing in gardens – whether botanic, RHS, National Trust, National Trust for Scotland or many others, for example Bristol Zoo. These are also ‘Endangered in Cultivation’; 35 more, not found in gardens or collections, are however listed as available from one or two of 15 nurseries listed in the Plant Finder 2014 (grey text in the ‘Threatened’ list); There are 336 which sadly have not yet been found anywhere and are ‘Critical in Cultivation’ (red text in the ‘Threatened’ list).
Are they worth finding?
Many were bred by British nurserymen, as Richard Hodson pointed out in the BCS August Newsletter. 29 were included in the Gardener’s Guide to Growing Clematis by Raymond Evison (1998). 16 were recommended in the Pocket Guide to Clematis by Mary Toomey, Everett Leeds and Charles Chesshire (2006). And we have only just started the process of gathering this information. Occasionally, one seems commonly available, but the true form is rarely supplied: we have recently been alerted to C. armandii ‘Snowdrift’ and C. ‘Picton’s Variety’ in this regard
There will also be, at this stage, inaccuracies in the list which follows, such as names which have never been registered; plants which are so widely available (from places such as supermarkets) that nurseries don’t even bother with them; or are so common in another country that they should be of less conservation concern here; lookalikes; or those that never should have been allowed out in the first place! Any corrections are welcome and will be used to update our lists immediately. What can I do?
1. Do you grow one of the ‘Threatened’ cultivars? Please contact Richard Hodson (richardhaw@talktalk.net) who is collating details of BCS members’ ‘Threatened’ plants. Already, C. 'Shropshire Blue' has been found in this way.
Plant Heritage members: you may register online directly as a Plant Guardian for your plant.
2. If your garden is regularly open to the public, the Project welcomes your plant records for all cultivars (not just clematis; we are currently evaluating hundreds of genera), and in return we will report directly which ‘Threatened’ plants you hold – and whether you might even have the last remaining one. We now review plant records from several hundred gardens and conservation schemes.
3. If you fancy poring over old books or catalogues, I can send you lists to compare: you could discover more long-lost friends to add to those already known.
4. We would welcome recommendations of those ‘Threatened’ clematis you, or a published reference, believe to be particularly worthy of conservation, and why (such as historical interest, garden value, breeding potential). Meanwhile, we will be asking our Collection Holders and others (thank you to Everett Leeds and Mike Brown who have been reviewing some early draft lists).
‘Threatened’ Clematiscultivars identified by Plant Heritage as at 1st October 2014: Current lists and more information are available from TPP at this web address: http://www.nccpg.com/TPP/Technical-data.aspx
Plants featured here:
C. montana var. rubens ‘Veitch’, last listed in the Plant Finder in 2010. ‘Endangered in Cultivation’ .
C. ‘East Malling’, new to the Plant Finder in 1998 and last listed 2012, but offered in Plant Heritage’s members’ Plant Exchange in 2012. ‘Endangered in Cultivation’ .
C. × vedrariensis ‘Highdown’, last listed in the Plant Finder in 2012, although recommended by Raymond Evison in the Gardener’s Guide to Growing Clematis in 1998. ‘Endangered in Cultivation’ .
C. ‘John Gould Veitch’, last listed in the Plant Finder in 2006, is still recorded growing at one public garden. Raymond Evison in Clematis for Small Spaces (2007): ‘All except one of these old double cultivars, C. ‘John Gould Veitch’ introduced in 1862 from Japan, have now been lost to cultivation – and although this is still a lovely and historical cultivar, the double cultivars grown today are vastly superior’
For some, standard specimens are held at Wisley: live plants haven’t yet been found in gardens or on a nursery. Scans supplied courtesy of RHS Wisley.
C. ‘Gemini’, 1990 herbarium specimen. New to Plant Finder in 2000, last listed in 2012.
‘Critical in Cultivation’ .
C. ‘Amelia Joan’, 1996 herbarium specimen. New to Plant Finder in 2001, no current suppliers. ‘Critical in Cultivation’ .
C. × cartmanii ‘Joanna’, 1996 herbarium specimen. Last listed in Plant Finder in 1997.
‘Critical in Cultivation’ .
C. ‘Aoife’, 2002 herbarium specimen. New to Plant Finder in 2001, last listed in 2004.
‘Critical in Cultivation’ .
Wisley Herbarium Sheet C.'Amelia Joan'
Wisley Herbarium Sheet C.'Aoife'
Wisley Herbarium Sheet C.'Gemini'
Wisley Herbarium Sheet C.× cartmanii'Joanna'
The Clematis 2014
‘Threatened’ Clematiscultivars identified by Plant Heritage as at 1st October 2014
C. 'Acton Pride'
C. 'Ada Sari'
C. 'Aino'
C. 'Ajisai'
C. 'Akemi'
C. 'Akeshina'
C. 'Albatross'
C. 'Aleksandrit'
C. 'Al-nor'
C. alpina 'Alba Belsay'
C. alpina 'Aquarius'
C. alpina 'Boulaha'
C. 'Alpinist'
C. 'Amelia Joan'
C. 'Ameshisuto'
C. 'Amy'
C. 'Anders'
C. 'Anna'
C. 'Anna German'
C. 'Anna Karolina'
C. 'Annemieke'
C. 'Annie Treasure'
C. 'Anouchka'
C. 'Anti'
C. 'Aoife'
C. 'Apulejus'
C. armandii 'Snowdrift'
C. 'Asagasumi'
C. 'Ashitaka'
C. 'Aurora Borealis'
C. 'Ballet Skirt'
C. 'Baltyk'
C. 'Barbara Wheeler'
C. 'Basil Bartlett'
C. 'Beauty of Richmond'
C. 'Benedictus'
C. 'Bessie Watkinson'
C. 'Betty'
C. 'Big Bird'
C. 'Blue Diamond'
C. 'Hania'
C. 'Blue Gem'
C. 'Blue Japan'
C. 'Blue Stream'
C. 'Blue Tapers'
C. 'Blush Queen'
C. 'Blushing Ballerina'
C. × bonstedtii 'Campanile'
C. 'Boskoop Beauty'
C. 'Boskoop Glory'
C. 'Bowl of Beauty'
C. 'Bracebridge Star'
C. 'Bravo'
C. 'Burford Bell'
C. 'Burford Variety'
C. 'C.W. Dowman'
C. 'Candida'
C. 'Caroline Lloyd'
C. × cartmanii 'Joanna'
C. × cartmanii 'Snow Valley'
C. 'Cassiopeia'
C. 'Centre Attraction'
C. 'Cherry Brandy'
C. 'Christian Steven'
C. cirrhosa 'Ballerina'
C. 'Claudius'
C. 'Clochette Pride'
C. 'Coerulea Linacea'
C. 'Colette Deville'
C. 'Corry'
C. 'Cotton Candy'
C. crispa 'Cylindrica'
C. 'Czarna Madonna'
C. 'Darlene'
C. 'Dilly Dilly'
C. 'Directeur André Devillers'
C. 'Docteur Le Bêle'
C. 'Doggy'
C. 'Donna'
C. 'Dorota'
C. 'Dorothy Tolver'
C. 'Kasugayama'
C. 'Dovedale'
C. 'Dubysa'
C. 'Dulcie'
C. 'East Malling'
C. 'East Sunset'
C. 'Ebba'
C. 'Elfin'
C. 'Elisabeth Foster'
C. 'Ellenbank White'
C. 'Emajõgi'
C. 'Emerald Stars'
C. 'Empress of India'
C. 'Erik'
C. 'Étoile de Paris'
C. 'Europa'
C. 'Eva'
C. 'Fairy'
C. 'Fairy Queen'
C. 'Farrago'
C. 'Fay'
C. 'Firefly'
C. flammula 'Ithaca'
C. 'Floral Feast'
C. 'Forever'
C. 'Four Star'
C. 'Fragrant Joy'
C. 'Fujinami'
C. 'G. Steffner'
C. 'Gekkyuuden'
C. 'Gemini'
C. 'Georg Ots'
C. 'Glynderek'
C. 'Gornoe Ozero'
C. 'Grandiflora Sanguinea'
C. 'Gravetye Seedling'
C. 'Green Parrot'
C. 'Green Velvet'
C. 'Guiding Star'
C. 'Hainton Ruby'
C. 'Halina Noll'
C. marata 'Temple Prince'
The Clematis 2014
C. 'Harlequin'
C. 'Harmony'
C. 'Haru-no-hoshi'
C. 'Haruyama'
C. 'Heirloom'
C. 'Helen Cropper'
C. heracleifolia 'Alba'
C. heracleifolia 'Frilly'
C. heracleifolia 'Jaggards'
C. 'Herbert Johnson'
C. 'Hidcote Purple'
C. 'Hint of Pink'
C. 'Hythe Chiffchaff'
C. 'Ice Maiden'
C. 'Ice Queen'
C. 'Ideal'
C. 'Ilka'
C. 'Imperial'
C. 'Inglewood'
C. 'Inshriach'
C. integrifolia 'Cascade'
C. integrifolia 'Finnis Form'
C. intricata 'Harry Smith'
C. 'Ishobel'
C. 'Iubileinyi-70'
C. 'Jackmanii Rubra'
C. 'Jadwiga Teresa'
C. 'Janis Ruplens Number 1'
C. 'Jashio'
C. 'Jasper'
C. 'Jefferies'
C. 'Jennifer Valentine'
C. 'Jim Hollis'
C. 'Joan Baker'
C. 'Joan Gray'
C. 'Joan Picton'
C. 'John Gould Veitch'
C. 'John Gudmundsson'
C. 'Jorma'
C. 'Kaleidoscope'
C. 'Musashino'
C. 'Katharina'
C. 'Katherine'
C. 'Kathleen Wheeler'
C. 'Keith Richardson'
C. 'Ken Hall's Form'
C. 'Ketu'
C. 'King George V'
C. 'Kinokawa'
C. 'Kirimäe'
C. 'Kjell'
C. 'Klaara'
C. 'Kosmicheskaia Melodiia'
C. 'Kotkas'
C. 'Krakow'
C. 'Krakowiak'
C. 'Kuba'
C. 'Lady Catherine'
C. 'Lady in Red'
C. 'Last Dance'
C. 'Laura'
C. 'Laura Denny'
C. 'Lauren'
C. 'Lavender Lace'
C. 'Leoni'
C. 'Liisu'
C. 'Lilactime'
C. 'Linava'
C. 'Lincolnshire Lady'
C. 'Lisboa'
C. 'Little Joe'
C. 'Lucie'
C. 'Lucey'
C. 'Luther Burbank'
C. 'M. Johnson'
C. 'Macrantha'
C. macropetala 'Ballerina'
C. macropetala 'Chili'
C. macropetala 'Markham'
C. 'Madame van Houtte'
C. 'Mammut'
C. 'Phoenix'
C. marata 'Temple Queen'
C. 'Marcel Moser'
C. 'Margaret Jones'
C. 'Margaret Wood'
C. 'Maria'
C. 'Maria Louise Jensen'
C. 'Mary Whistler'
C. 'Mary-Claire'
C. 'Matilda'
C. 'Matka Siedliska'
C. 'Matka Teresa'
C. 'Matka Urszula Ledóchowska'
C. 'Matthias'
C. 'Meeli'
C. 'Meloodia'
C. 'Memm'
C. 'Mevrouw Oud'
C. 'Mia'
C. 'Michelle'
C. 'Mikla'
C. 'Miss Crawshay'
C. montana 'Fragrant Dancer'
C. montana 'Lilacina'
C. montana 'Lucinda'
C. montana 'Silver Dancer'
C. montana 'Snow'
C. montana 'Sue'
C. montana 'Tiny Moll'
C. m. var. rubens 'Brookfield Clove'
C. montana var. rubens 'Veitch'
C. m. var. wilsonii 'Hergest'
C. montana 'Vicki'
C. × morelii 'Boulevard'
C. 'Morning Glory'
C. 'Mrs Bush'
C. 'Mrs Hope'
C. 'Mrs P.T. James'
C. 'Mrs Sam McCready'
C. 'Mukle'
C. 'Muly'
C. 'Sakurahime'
C. 'Myojo'
C. 'Myoko'
C. 'Nadezhda'
C. 'Negristka'
C. 'Nikolai Rubtsov'
C. 'Norfolk Queen'
C. 'Notpy'
C. 'Nuit de Chine'
C. 'Nunn's Gift'
C. 'Oberek'
C. occidentalis 'Big Horns'
C. ochotensis 'Carmen Rose'
C. 'Ola Howells'
C. 'Olga'
C. 'Olimpiada-80'
C. 'Oonagare Ichigoo'
C. orientalis 'Rubromarginata'
C. 'Otto Fröbel'
C. 'Paala'
C. 'Paddington'
C. 'Pafar'
C. 'Päkapikk'
C. 'Pamina'
C. 'Paola'
C. 'Pastel Pink'
C. 'Pat Ann'
C. 'Pat Coleman'
C. patens 'Korean Moon'
C. patens 'Nagoya'
C. patens 'Sanda'
C. 'Pearl Rose'
C. 'Penelope'
C. 'Percy Picton'
C. 'Perryhill Pearl'
C. 'Peter Pan'
C. petriei 'Limelight'
C. petriei 'Princess'
C. petriei 'Steepdown'
C. 'Peveril Pendant'
C. 'Phil Mason'
C. 'Teksa'
C. 'Picton's Variety'
C. 'Pink Pearl'
C. 'Pointy'
C. 'Prairie'
C. 'Prairie River'
C. 'Pribaltika'
C. 'Prince Philip'
C. 'Princess'
C. 'Prins Hendrik'
C. 'Pulmapäev'
C. 'Purple Treasure'
C. quadribracteolata 'Nancy's Lookout'
C. 'Queen Alexandra'
C. 'Radar Love'
C. 'Radiant'
C. 'Radost'
C. 'Ragamuffin'
C. 'Rahvarinne'
C. recta 'Atropurpurea'
C. recta 'Lime Close'
C. recta 'Peveril'
C. 'Red 5'
C. 'Red Ballon'
C. 'Reiman'
C. 'Ria'
C. 'Riga'
C. 'Ristimägi'
C. 'Rødklokke'
C. 'Rodomax'
C. 'Roko'
C. 'Roogoja'
C. 'Rosa Königskind'
C. 'Rose Supreme'
C. 'Rosugyana'
C. 'Rozalia'
C. 'Rubra'
C. 'Ruby Anniversary'
C. 'Ruby Lady'
C. 'Saalomon'
C. 'Sakala'
C. 'Tuchka'
The Clematis 2014
C. 'Salmon Blush'
C. 'Sandra Denny'
C. 'Sano-no-murasaki'
C. 'Saruga'
C. 'Satsukibare'
C. 'Schneeglanz'
C. 'Seeryuu'
C. 'Serebrianyi Rucheek'
C. 'Serenata'
C. 'Sheila Thacker'
C. 'Sherriffii'
C. 'Shirakihane'
C. 'Shiva'
C. 'Shogun'
C. 'Shooun'
C. 'Shorty'
C. 'Shropshire Blue'
C. sibirica 'Altai'
C. 'Siirus'
C. 'Silmakivi'
C. 'Silver Lady'
C. 'Silver Lining'
C. 'Simi'
C. 'Sizaia Ptitsa'
C. 'Solina'
C. 'Solweig'
C. 'Souvenir de J.L. Delbard'
C. 'Spooneri Rosea'
C. stans 'Rusalka'
C. 'Stars & Stripes'
C. 'Strawberry Roan'
C. 'Sun Stor'
C. 'Suruga'
C. 'Susan Allsop'
C. 'Suzanne'
C. 'Sympatia'
C. tangutica subsp. obtusiuscula 'Gravetye Variety'
C. 'Tartu'
C. tashiroi 'Yellow Peril'
C. 'Tateshina'
C. 'Waterperry Star'
The Clematis 2014
C. 'Tentel'
C. 'Teruko'
C. 'Tevia'
C. 'The Comet'
C. 'The Dubliner'
C. 'The Velvet'
C. 'Theydon Belle'
C. 'Thyrislund'
C. tibetana subsp. vernayi 'Lorcan O'Brien'
C. 'Titania'
C. 'Trianon'
C. 'Triibu'
C. 'Triinu'
C. 'Trikatrei'
C. tubulosa 'Alba'
C. 'Ulrique'
C. 'Unity'
C. 'Vanilla Cream'
C. × vedrariensis 'Highdown'
C. 'Velutina Purpurea'
C. 'Venosa'
C. 'Vetka'
C. 'Vicky'
C. 'Violet Charm'
C. 'Violet Purple'
C. 'Violetta'
C. viticella 'Small Purple'
C. ‘Vitiwester’
C. 'Vivienne Lawson'
C. 'W.S. Callick'
C. 'Western Virgin'
C. 'White Tokyo'
C. 'Wilhelmina Tull'
C. 'Winsford Seedling'
C. 'Wistaria Purple'
C. 'Wolga'
C. 'Yaichi'
C. 'Yellow Pinocchio'
C. 'Yorkshire Pride'
C. 'Yuki-no-yoso'oi'
C. 'Zato'
C. 'Zingaro'
C. 'Zopre'
C. 'Zolotoi Iubilei'
Dr Kalani Seymour is the Threatened Plants Project Manager at Plant Heritage (NCCPG), 12 Home Farm, Loseley Park, Guildford, Surrey GU3 1HS. She can be contacted at TPP@plantheritage.org.uk or on 01483 447 540.
Everett Leeds
Watching Them Grow: Seedling Forms in Clematis
Daniel Falck Finland danielxfalck@gmail.com
First stirrings
IIfirst became interested in the differences between seedlings when I started growing Clematis from seeds, some years ago. Often, when we start growing clematis from seeds, we don’t quite end up with what we thought we would. Trawling the web brought me to Essig’s seminal article (1991) discussing his observations that there are two main groups of clematis seedlings, and how this might affect how these plants are classified, taxonomically.
Following the seedlings carefully may give clues whether the seeds are from the desired group of plants at all. This seems to work whichever method of sowing seeds one adopts: sowing directly into pots, doing the so called ‘baggie method’ (starting seeds in a zip-lock bag in vermiculite or equivalent substrate), as well as with petri culture.
In my opinion, it is not as important whether the seedlings follow hypogeal or epigeal germination (growing point stays under the surface = hypogeal, or are pushed up through the medium, into the light: emergent = epigeal, respectively) as the distinction between the seedlings with opposite or alternate first true leaves. This is because there seems to be variation even within the same species in regard to the germination type; (cf. Grey-Wilson 2000, 31); I have noticed this with some plants, e.g. C. flammula.
A steep learning curve brought me to Tamura’s (1987) and Magnus Johnson’s (2001)
classifications of Clematis and how they have used these seedling characteristics to distinguish between different groups of plants. Johnson called these stirps (or branches) in his monumental work. He divided the whole genus Clematis into two distinct groups: stirps oppositae and stirps alternatae. In oppositae, the seedling’s first and all subsequent true leaves are always arranged opposite each other; in alternatae, the first true leaves are single and alternate, then this changes, and all subsequent leaves are produced in pairs, opposite each other, as the seedling develops (with C. alternata being the exception to the rule). In simplified format, Johnson’s arrangement is as per the following table:
Clematisafoliata
Clematiscunninghamii
Clematisfruticosa
Clematishuchouensis
Stirpsoppositae Stirpsalternatae
Section
Flammula
Fruticella all the other 14 sections
Pterocarpa
Viorna
Viticella
It is interesting to compare this classification with the DNA research done in the 2000s. Miikeda & al. (2006) and the more recent Chinese study (Xie & al. 2011) both refer to Essig’s article when discussing morphological features along their DNA based hypotheses of evolutionary history (phylogeny). Their results clearly suggest that this seedling characteristic might have evolved just once, unlike several other characteristics, which seem to have evolved many times (e.g. bell-shaped flowers). Judging from this, it seems that there might indeed be molecular data supporting this distinction into two large groups, in the genus Clematis.
Growing knowledge
Kindly helped by other avid clematarians, I have information on 36 new species (and “species”), ten of which are ‘type species’ of their respective sections or subsections, to add to Essig’s 58. They represent about a third of all Clematis species in nature. The lack of the tropical species is very clear. It skews the results and what can be concluded from them. The plant names marked in the following table with “quotation marks” imply that the seeds were acquired from a cultivated plant. A garden grown plant is likely to hybridise with others and, hence, the results are not reliable. I believe that they are still pointing at the right direction. The cataphylls are awl-like, reduced leaves, often found on the seedlings of the sections Viticella and Viorna before the true leaves. Some of my results are tentative, which is why I’ve placed them in brackets.
Clematisispahanica
Clematismontana
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TABLE OF GERMINATION DATA
* information kindly provided by Helen Poirier ** information kindly provided by Brian Collingwood *** information kindly provided by Ton Hannink
Name Germination First leaves Indentation Cataphylls
C. acerifolia epigeal alternate yes no
C. afoliata epigeal alternate yes (v. weak) no
C. “akoensis” alternate yes ***
C.” brachiata” epigeal alternate yes no
C. “chiisanensis” epigeal alternate yes no
C. “cirrhosa” epigeal alternate yes no
C. columbiana v. tenuiloba epigeal alternate yes no *
C. connata (CC7137) epigeal alternate yes no
C. cunninghamii epigeal alternate yes no
C. “fruticosa” alternate (near opposite) yes
C. intricata (Pavelka) sp 194) epigeal alternate yes no
C. “ispahanica” epigeal alternate no no
C. “koreana” epigeal alternate yes no
C. ladakhiana (CC7135) epigeal alternate yes (v. weak) no
C. montana (G11161) epigeal alternate yes no
C. occidentalis v. dissecta epigeal alternate yes no *
C. “otophora” epigeal alternate yes no
C. paniculata epigeal alternate yes no
C. “phlebantha” epigeal alternate yes no **
C. “potaninii” alternate *
C. “stans” epigeal alternate yes no
C. “tubulosa” (as heracleifolia v davidiana) epigeal alternate yes no *
C. “urticifolia” epigeal alternate yes no
C. yunnanensis (BO 13-028) epigeal alternate yes no
C. armandii opposite no
C. ”cadmia” (both) opposite no ***
C. “coactilis” hypogeal opposite no yes
C. ”courtoisii” (both) opposite yes (yes) ***
C. ”flammula” both opposite no no
C. “florida” epigeal opposite yes no
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C. “fremontii” hypogeal opposite no no
C. huchouensis” epigeal opposite no no
C. “lanuginosa” opposite no ***
C. “obscura” epigeal opposite no no
C. “uncinata” epigeal opposite (near alternate) no (yes)
C. vinacea (Ocoee River) hypogeal opposite no (no)
In general, it is easy to divide the seedlings in two groups based on grouping seedlings with alternate first leaves with indentation on one side, and those with opposite and entire leaves on the other. However, there are exceptions. Essig notes that C. terniflora, with opposite leaves, tends to have nonentire margins. I have noticed this as well.
← Seedling of Clematis paniculata
Intriguingly, the close relatives C. florida and C. courtoisii seem to have indentations in their first leaves, too. One can speculate that this characteristic has evolved at least two times in the plants classified within the stirps oppositae
Some of the closest relatives to Clematis within the buttercup family (Ranunculaceae) are plants from Anemone and Pulsatilla genera.
All the Anemone and Pulsatilla “species” I have grown from seeds have shown epigeal germination and alternate first leaves with non-entire margins. This suggests that plants in Johnson’s stirps alternatae are closer to the common ancestor with Anemone and Pulsatilla than those in the stirps oppositae, which would be furthest evolved from it. Obviously, this is just one characteristic among others and, as such, cannot definitively determine the direction of evolution. What I find interesting is that C. “ispahanica” and C. “fruticosa” seedlings behave just like plants from the section Meclatis. This echoes Wim Snoeijer’s (2008, 70) observation that the cultivated specimens of C. fruticosa, C. ispahanica and C. songarica belong in the Tangutica Group, as was described in his work.
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Furthermore, since Clematis “phlebantha” apparently germinates like any other plant of the stirps alternatae, it seems that Johnson’s view (following Tamura) of placing section Fruticella in the stirps oppositae is not well founded. Hopefully, a new study based on DNA will find new ways to think about these species as well.
Clematisphlebanthagermination →
Essig wrote that there have not been any crosses made between plants with these different types of seedling morphology. There has been some controversy about this, partly because Tamura and Johnson considered the section Fruticella to be characterised by opposite seedling leaves. However, since at least a major part of the section Fruticella plants are alternate, including the type species C. fruticosa, it is no wonder that these apparently ‘crossstirps’ hybrids have been possible.
Same Clematis phlebantha seedling, exactly four weeks later. Plant is steadily producing alternate foliage Some examples include Clematis ‘Buckland Cascade’ (C. songarica × ‘Bells of Emei Shan’) and C. ‘Sundance’
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(C. ispahanica × unknown Tangutica Group plant). The (only?) putative ‘cross-stirps’ hybrid between C. recta and C. tubulosa, ‘Edward Prichard’, remains to be investigated further. 21 days further on and the seedling now ‘switches off’ alternate foliage, and ‘switches on’ opposite foliage
Here is a small additional titbit: If you happen to get a seedling with opposite seedling leaves, and the stem above the cotyledons withers, for one reason or other, there is a possibility for the plant to recover, since these plants have dormant buds at the axils of the cotyledons (see Johnson 2001). This has saved some of my own seedlings from perishing before their time – a happy occurrence, especially with my attempts at making hybrids.
With the seeds from nature becoming more and more available to more and more clematis enthusiasts, I encourage everyone to keep records of their seedlings. Growing seedlings equals growing knowledge about these plants. I think that the shape of the cotyledons in addition to the presence/absence of margin indentation on the first true leaves could prove to be highly valuable characteristics. The records of seed growing clematarians could provide critical support to some scientific research.
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8 more days pass; rapid extension growth starts; the plant is producing opposite foliage and will never again produce alternate leaves.
References
BOOKS
Grey-Wilson, C. 2000. Clematis The Genus. A Ccomprehensive Guide for Gardeners, Horticulturists and Botanists. London: B T Batsford.
Johnson, M. 2001. The Genus Clematis Södertälje: Magnus Johnson Plantskola AB.
Snoeijer, W. 2008. Clematis Cultivar Group Classification with Identifying Key and Diagrams Gouda: Wim Snoeijer.
PUBLISHED PAPERS
Miikeda, O. et al. 2006. Phylogenetic relationships of Clematis (Ranunc.) based on plastid (chloroplast) and nuclear DNA sequences. Botanical Journal of Linnean Society 152: 153-168.
Essig, F. 1991. Seedling morphology in Clematis (Ranunculaceae) and its taxonomic implications. SIDA 14(3): 377-390.
Tamura, M. 1987. Classification of Genus Clematis. Acta Phytotax. Geobot. 38: 33-44. Xie, L. & al. 2011. Phylogenetic Analyses of Clematis (Ranunculaceae) based on Sequences of Nuclear Ribosomal ITS and Three Plastid Regions. Systematic Botany 36(4): 907-921.
embers may recall my description of a new Heracleifolia Group seedling in last year’s The Clematis. The plant is an open pollinated seedling which I found in my garden, growing between Clematis heracleifolia 'Cassandra' and Clematis 'Eclipse'. I provisionally named it ‘Chris’, in memory of my late husband. Marcus Dancer succeeded in propagating the plant and Julian Noble agreed to trial it, at his home; a cutting was duly given to him, last year. He has an amazing south facing, steeply terraced garden, high up above Portsmouth, with wonderful views of Portsmouth Harbour. I visited them last summer when I went to Liz Gibbison’s open garden, on 29th June.
This August, Julian sent me pictures of his plant of ‘Chris’, growing in a big pot in his garden. He reports it as being twenty-six inches high with the largest floret two feet in height. Julian expressed his delight about the plant’s progress
← 'Chris' is fairly compact for an Heracleifolia, with far less stem and more flowers than any of my other plants from the same Group. It has attractive, bright green leaves (like 'Eclipse') which I love, and sports an abundance of tightly clustered, richly perfumed heads of deep violet-blue flowers (similar to 'Cassandra'). The fragrance is just divine. I am absolutely thrilled with it this year.
‘Chris’, temporarily in a large pot All Images Val Le May Neville-Parry I also gave a plant to Keith Shortland and I gather his has also done well this year. In fact, so well that he intends digging it up and putting it into a large pot just outside the
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front door, where visitors can appreciate its good looks and powerful, sweet perfume.
Keith tells me that he will be cutting it back by half soon, to reduce wind damage, with a final prune in early spring. That makes good sense to me and is, perhaps, useful advice to other BCS members who are growing, or are interested in growing, plants from this Group?
You need a lot of space for this tribe of plants, but they can be grown in pots, as long as there is plenty of room. They are herbaceous subshrubs and like free draining compost around their roots, and prefer a sunny position. They are ideal for mixing into the herbaceous border with other perennials and are easy to grow. They don’t get wilt. Some are self-supporting whereas others scramble over any nearby shrubs. Like other perennials they die back in winter and re-emerge into the warmth of spring. These clematis are great to use as cut flowers and marvellous for flower arranging.
The flowers vary from deep violet-blue to light lavender-grey and most cultivars have a heavenly perfume; once you have experienced the delicious fragrance you will doubtless want several more of them in your garden.
My own plant has this summer been lost in a sea of self set geraniums. As a result, it got quite leggy and pale; I am, however, moving it to a sunnier, more open site in the next few weeks. I will be following the above advice and will cut it back by half fairly soon, giving some protection from the worst of the winds, then right back, in the early part of spring. I have already done this with numerous other Heracleifolia plants as, due to their voluminous foliage, exposure to strong winds can cause them some damage.
Clematis ‘Advent Bells’
Aidan Armitage UK aidanarmitage@btinternet.com
IIfirst became interested in the Cirrhosa Group of clematis twenty-six years ago, when I first saw and was intrigued by the fern-like leaves of Clematis cirrhosa var. balearica, and its small bell shaped creamy white flowers, spotted with maroon on the inside. Since then, my interest in the Group has grown and I have acquired a number of Clematis cirrhosa derived cultivars, as well as a superb specimen of Clematis napaulensis, a related species from Nepal, which was gathered in the wild by Crûg Farm plants.
I was therefore extremely excited when, several years ago, I discovered that Roy Nunn had crossed C. napaulensis with C. cirrhosa var. purpurascens 'Freckles'. Roy very kindly sent me a cutting, which I duly nurtured into a strong, healthy plant. It flowered for the first time in the winter of 2012/13; and again in 2013/14. Roy had called it 'Advent Bells' because it flowered around Advent, the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day.
The plant goes into summer dormancy from around the end of May until the beginning of September. During this period it looks dead; the leaves die back, leaving just the stems, bare and brown. The plant has not died, though! In September it suddenly springs back into life, producing new leaves, and flowers, on the previous year's ripened growth.
In similar fashion to other C. cirrhosa types, the tiny flower buds are produced at the same time that it comes into leaf. These flowers make 'Advent Bells’ a really special plant.
The bell shaped blooms hang in clusters of four; they are pinkish cream on the outside, with heavy red mottling on the inside. The stamens consist of green filaments with striking reddish pink anthers, and lime green styles; the overall effect of the colour combination is very eye catching indeed.
The C. cirrhosa types are described as ‘half hardy’ and should be grown in a sheltered south facing position, and not be allowed to become too wet in the winter. Any tidying of the plant should be carried out immediately after the flowering is finished. I would apply this advice to 'Advent Bells'.
Flowers in clusters →
Roy adds that 'Advent Bells' has survived some very cold winters in his Cambridgeshire garden.
IIn the early 1970s my husband John was given a ‘funny looking plant’, in a pot, by one of the horticultural students at Cannington College, where he worked. As head of the Engineering Department, John taught Agricultural, Horticultural and Dairying (refrigeration, pasteurisation, boilers, heating, ventilation, lighting etc) students. John was always interested in Clematis – he would take from our garden whichever plant or plants were in flower, put them in a pot (with a label)… and then place the pot on the very back table of the horticulture class! We were just developing the Mill Garden, Cannington, at the time, so we put this ‘odd’ clematis against a ten foot high south facing stone wall. It just grew stems; we kept tucking them behind wires, until it reached about six feet, when it cascaded down – and flowered. It does not cling; it just produces round green stems with the odd very small triangular leaf. The flowers are creamy yellow, very scented bells, coming from around May. Many, years later Ray Evison, returning from his trip to New Zealand, gave a talk to a BCS meeting during which he showed some slides of the ‘Rush-stemmed clematis’. There, it grows on the cliffs of South Island, facing the ‘roaring forties’. It has developed tough green stems to withstand harsh conditions – and also carry out the task of photosynthesis. C afoliata; ‘afoliata’ meaning ‘without leaves’.
Clematisafoliata,male form, plant and flowers
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We found it easy to grow from cuttings, and that our plant was the male form. We did eventually manage to acquire a female plant too; alas, she died the following year, so we never got any seed, a real pity.
It is a great plant to show our visitors from garden clubs and tours – we always say to them, ‘What do you think it is?’ I have only ever seen one other plant of C. afoliata and that was at Kew. When we moved from the Mill to our current home, we took the plant with us, so I still have my cherished C. afoliata in my new little garden. From TheInternationalClematisRegisterandChecklist:
Clematisafoliata J. Buch.
Flowers male and female on separate plants, bowl-shaped to broadly bell-shaped, 34 cm across, nodding or upright, scented, borne 1-3 (sometimes as many as 6) in the leaf axils. Sepals 4-6 greenish yellow to greenish white, 1.5-2.5 x 0.5-1 cm in male flowers, smaller in female, ovate oblong to lanceolate, blunt to almost pointed, outside downy. Staminodes few. Stamens cream. Fruit heads persistent.
Achenes red-brown, 3-4 mm long, ovoid, hairy; styles about 2 cm. Evergreen shrub, stems sprawling rather than climbing, to 3 m, becoming woody, yellow green to dark green, branched, finely grooved, hairless.
Leaves present only on young or shaded shoots, usually reduced to leaf stalks and leaflet stalks, simple or sometimes ternate, hairless. Flowers in the UK from May to June (or March to April, under glass); August to November in the southern hemisphere, on previous season’s growth. Natural occurrence: New Zealand, on both N. and S. Islands.
Clematis napaulensis
Aidan Armitage UK aidanarmitage@btinternet.com
CClematis napaulensis is, in cultivation, often regarded as a conservatory or greenhouse plant which proves hardy only in milder areas. However, as our knowledge of this fascinating species increases, it is clear that its hardiness is, in fact, quite variable. The species has a very wide distribution and the degree of hardiness seems to correlate with the area and habitat where particular plants are collected from; as one might anticipate, general growth habit and form are also somewhat variable – this, too, is to be expected, given the enormous geographical range of this species in the wild. I acquired my C. napaulensis in 2009, from Crûg Farm Plants, near Caernarfon in North Wales. Bleddyn and Sue Wynn-Jones, the owners, had grown a C. napaulensis from wild collected seed they had brought back from one of their plant hunting expeditions in
My plant: following the dormancy period, flowers and leaves appear, simultaneously
Over the years, the plant had grown into a vigorous specimen, twenty feet or more in height, covering one of their south facing barns. When I visited, the ground beneath it was packed with C. napaulensis seedlings (these are transplanted and sold by Crûg as individual cultivated plants, hence no wild seed collection number). The mother plant is fully hardy in this sheltered spot and has survived some recent very cold winters.
I planted my C. napaulensis in my Leeds garden on a south facing fence, on fairly sheltered sloping ground, with good topsoil over heavy clay – not ideal conditions, but because of the slope it is quite well drained. It took three years before it had settled in sufficiently to produce the first flowers, in the winter of 2012 – disappointingly few in number. However, by the winter of 2013 the plant had grown lots of ripened stems and was absolutely covered in lush green foliage, every vine heavily festooned with clusters of pendulous, narrow bell shaped flowers.
The plant is semi-evergreen; during May, to the end of September, it sheds its foliage and the stems look dead. As September ends and October begins, though, it suddenly comes back to life, forming tiny flower buds and new leaves, simultaneously. The flowers are produced in groups from the leaf axils and are pale yellow, recurving at the tips. The deep purple stamens hang down like a curtain of miniature oars, making an elegant contrast with the cream white styles and stigmas.
Clearly, there are a number of variants of Clematis napaulensis in cultivation today; luckily, my plant has inherited the hardiness of the Crûg plant, surviving the recent freezing winters in the north of England, down to -12°C. Going back to my opening sentence, this confirms to me that the hardiness of C. napaulensis, in cultivation, is probably just a consequence of the altitude and region of the Nepal (or bordering) area from which it was originally derived.
The Three Variants of Clematis patens of Shinshiro
Mariko Nakanishi Japan ericat.2@comet.ocn.ne.jp
C Clematis patens occurs in several localities in and around the Shinshiro City area. Due to physical factors, most of the natural habitats of the Shinshiro C. patens remain well protected and out of reach. This is because the plants are, for the most part, located in mountainous Serpentinite regions; the steep and crumbly slopes are exceedingly difficult to climb or otherwise negotiate, and, as is the norm in such wetland areas, poisonous vipers and other snakes may be encountered.
This can be, therefore, a dangerous terrain to penetrate and one must be extremely prudent not to venture beyond a certain point, without careful preparations. On the one hand, these conditions mean that the habitats are protected from human interference or invasion; on the other, getting to see the plants demands much planning and care, and, even then, only certain plant populations are accessible. Nevertheless, it is my hope that areas such as this continue to remain as wild as they are at present – the truly natural Japanese scenery and landscape has been preserved solely on account of this challenging environment.
As for myself, I adore wandering in this gorgeous countryside, in the glorious summer sunshine, listening to the beautiful song of the native Japanese white-eye, filling the air all around. This landscape evokes a wonderful mood of serenity and tranquility.
Typical, dryer habitat of the smaller variant
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Vegetation around serpentinite rocks
The rock strata here are of a particular chemistry and geology, largely consisting of serpentinite (on which C. patens is found) and limestone. Serpentinite rock is very rich in magnesium and often also contains chromium and nickel. Chromium is rarely detrimental to the growth of plants, however the opposite applies to nickel; and large amounts of magnesium are poisonous to plants. In the serpentinite rock areas in the lower altitudes, shrubs such as red pine or azalea grow in relative abundance – these are the plants which can tolerate the high levels of magnesium. Due to this unusual rock chemistry, the serpentinite zones are often areas of high endemism (unique flora compared to the surrounding regions).
First type: Huge flowers, hirsute sepals, boldly coloured stamens, found in wetter areas
Serpentinite is a rock which has undergone metamorphosis; it is composed of ‘serpentine’ minerals and gets its name from its resemblance to snakeskin, with a mottled, waxy or resinous lustre and curving, polished surfaces. Serpentinite is very low in plant nutrients but high in toxic metals. It is common beneath the oceanic crust, where it forms by the modification of mantle rocks by pressure, water and very high temperatures. It is seldom seen on land except in areas where tectonic plates meet and crust rocks are forced below the surface (subduction). Most people call it serpentine (SER-penteen), or serpentine rock, but, more accurately, the term ‘serpentine’ describes the minerals that make up serpentinite (pronounced ser-PENT-inite).
The Clematis patens that grow in the Shinshiro area are of three distinct types: firstly, those that tend to occur mostly on the lower, wetter ground; they have beautiful, huge
Above and below: C.patens,hirsute type stunning white flowers and the backs of the sepals are covered with varying amounts of downy whitish hair. These flowers can sometimes reach as much as 17 cm in diameter. Prior to opening, the exterior of the buds become coated with fine hair and look adorable, but, as the sepals break apart, the stamens become the dominant feature, attracting the attention, resembling some giant crawling insect or other living creature. Once the flowers are fully open, the red colour of
The larger-flowered types tend to be found in wetter habitats
Second type: Smaller flowers, red bars on reverse, sepals not hirsute
Second type: Smaller flowers, red bars faintly visible through sepal
Third type: Smaller flowers, green bars on reverse, sepals not hirsute
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the central mass of stamens is hugely impressive, in contrast to the pure white sepals. Even after opening fully, the hair on the back sides persists, unchanged.
The other two types are not hirsute and the flowers are smaller, at about 10 cm, but the sepals carry striking red or green bars on the lower surface; this is a strong feature of the C. patens plants that grow in Serpentinite regions. There are also some similar plants in comparable locations in the Toki area, to the north. Usually, in the case of the redstriped flowers, the colour on the reverse is faintly visible from the front, through the sepals, imparting an elegant, eye-catching appearance; the green bars, however, are not visible from the front side, so the flowers have a pure, snowy white quality.
BCS Journal readers may recall that I first brought up the topic of these stunningly beautiful Clematis patens in the 2012 edition. Sometime after this, I was informed that there was also a version of the plant where the stripe on the back of the sepals was of a thrilling dark purple! Since then, I have ventured back to these areas, in hope of finding such astonishing plants; despite determined searching, though, I haven’t been able to find them, so far. I am not sure, therefore, if the purple form is still to be found in nature; I may just be looking in the wrong places, or perhaps they have just become very scarce, or even lost, by now. The prospect of finding such plants, however, is very exciting; my intention is to continue to search in the accessible areas for the C. patens with purple bars.
Japanese White-Eye: courting ritual
The Other Face of Fire: My On-going Love Affair with Clematis baldwinii
Fran Palmeri USA franpalmeri@gmail.com
LLast spring, driving by Oscar Scherer State Park, near my home in south Florida, I saw that rangers were burning the pine flatwoods. I was photographing, over the fence, when Tony Clements, the park manager came over to me. He described bell-like flowers on the edges of the conflagration and asked if I wanted to photograph them. I was surprised he had noticed them, but then I remembered that Tony was born in Wales. Flowers (and gardens) are in his blood.
Minutes later, I was stepping through burning embers in the still smouldering woods to photograph the pine hyacinth, Clematis baldwinii. Though some plants remained in fine shape, others were singed. No matter. I knew that a year from now we would see an explosive growth of wildflowers, including this Florida endemic, which favours recently burned areas.
Tony’s first encounter with prescribed burning in Florida was a shock. ‘It was like a snowstorm’, he says. ‘Everything seemed dead.’ But he was amazed by the results: ‘Within days, plants started popping up.’
As a child Tony explored the woods near his home in Betws, Wales, where he became interested in plants and bird watching. While visiting relatives, his parents fell in
love with America and in 1980, when Tony was ten, the family moved to North Port, Florida. There, he decided the outdoors would be his life. He volunteered at Oscar Scherer State Park in 1993 and the next year became a ranger. Through Forest Service
courses he learned the science of controlled burning and moved up to ‘burn boss’.
Discovering the other face of fire was the apotheosis of my green pilgrimage around Florida and it came right at the beginning. On an October evening in 2005, I found the scrubby flatwoods at Oscar Scherer in smoking ruins: Florida scrub jays gone, gopher tortoises gone, oaks, shrubs and wildflowers gone. Just a slash pine or two was left
standing and charred roots of saw palmetto snaked along the ground. I was horrified. But John Roche, then the park manager, reassured me that the scrub jays had flown to safety and the gopher tortoises had taken refuge in their roomy underground burrows,
along with many other animals including rabbits, lizards and snakes. ‘Wait ‘til you see the wildflowers next spring!’, he added, with a smile.
Like Tony, I became a believer when, within weeks, the saw palmetto put out green shoots, bracken fern pushed up out of the ashes and scrub oaks grew inches per week. After just months, creamy blooms of pawpaw, sky blue lupine, sabatia and blazing star
lit up the landscape. It looked like an army of farmers had been at work but it was just Mother Nature, planting with fire.
The use of fire is deeply entrenched throughout human history. Early man used it to ward off ticks and mosquitoes, clear land and hunt wild animals. Though Tony doesn’t recall seeing controlled burns in the Welsh landscape, swaling – the annual burning of
the gorse and scrub, to revitalize habitat for woodland grouse and other wildlife – is still practised in Britain. For thousands of years, farmers have burned fields to enrich grazing for livestock. England’s national parks – Dartmoor and Exmoor – carry out controlled burns on a set schedule.
‘Fire is buried deep in the British landscape’, writes Stephen J. Pyne in Vestal Fire. ‘Pleistocene glaciations and seas, however, scrubbed off the residue of biotic history like barnacles from a ship’s hull. Each onslaught of ice and water extinguished Britain’s fires, and each return of land and sun rekindled them’. Pyne, a world historian of fire, says that Britain absorbed fire practices from Europe and then exported them throughout the world. ‘Britain was the synopsis of European fire history…As much as any country
could, Britain defined, not merely experienced, the European understanding of fire’. Fire may be buried in the British landscape but in Florida, which Pyne calls the ‘most pyric state in America’, it’s right at the surface. Once, lightning-set fires swept unimpeded across the peninsula. The authors of Priceless Florida estimate that ‘on a single summer
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day, maybe a hundred fires start up naturally, in Florida thunderstorms’
Fire shapes the land as much as sun, wind and rain. Periodic blazes clear out litter, open up areas to sunlight, add nutrients to the soil, and revitalize the flora. Fire exclusion is a major cause of plant and animal extinction.
Where I live, burns in pine woods, pastures or parks are common –especially in spring and summer – fire seasons. I step out my door and smell smoke from burning ‘out east’ . ‘I burn every day of the year!’ a ranch manager once told me. As they are in Britain, controlled burns are strictly regulated.
Many Florida ecosystems are fireadapted, a realization that was a long time coming. The conventional wisdom was that all fire was destructive. A job of the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s was to extinguish wildfires.
During the 1940s and 1950s – the ‘Smoky the Bear’ era – prescribed fire was unheard of, though just a few naturalists, such as Aldo Leopold advocated it. It was not until 1962 that the first formal fire conference was held at Tall Timbers, in north Florida. Slowly, land managers put the new thinking into practice
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One early summer morning, ten of us gather to facilitate a burn on the Armstrong property in central Florida. Brooks and Nancy Armstrong have been burning regularly for many years so the ‘load’ is light and the chances of a fire getting out of hand, remote. Like Tony, Brooks studied fire ecology. He knows that conditions have to be nearly perfect and has postponed this burn several times, due to rain or high winds. On the drive east from Sarasota, I pass several ranches with columns of smoke rising straight up into a cloudless blue sky. Brooks uses an igniter and the fire eats up the saw palmetto. I hear the rush of flames and start running. Guess I’m still a city girl! Later, as I photograph the still-smoking field, I hear, off in the distance, a northern quail calling his name ‘Bobwhite Bobwhite’, no doubt approvingly, since he nests in recently burned areas.
Fire-maintained pine flatwoods
I’m always on the lookout for fire. One May, driving a back road in north Florida, I see that a wild fire has burned out a small patch of woods. Like bits of sky fallen to earth, Bartram’s Ixia (Calydorea coelestina) are sprinkled among the burnt pines. In1767 William Bartram discovered this wildflower near the St John’s River. Then it was ‘lost’ to science for 150 years until botanist John Kunkel Small found it near Starke, Florida. Bartram’s drawing of Calydorea caelestina, along with C. baldwinii, reside in the British Museum. As I photograph, I wonder how long the seeds have laid dormant, waiting to be awakened, like the Phoenix.
In 1835, at the time he was rewriting The French Revolution, which had been accidentally burnt by John Stuart Mill’s servant, Thomas Carlyle wrote ‘Fire is the best of servants; but what a master!’
At its best, the Florida landscape is magical. Visit a fire-maintained pine flatwoods and you will be greeted by lyonnia, blueberry, beautyberry, tarflower, pines covered with vines, mosses and lichen. There’s a supporting cast of deer, rabbits, dragonflies, lizards, snakes, ants, bees, butterflies, grasshoppers, warblers, woodpeckers, cardinals, perhaps even an eagle in her huge nest, atop a sturdy pine; at your feet, grasses, ferns and wildflowers – hypericum, goldenrod, asters, yellow bachelor’s buttons and, with luck, Clematis baldwinii, the beautiful pine hyacinth.
Stephen J. Pyne and William Cronon; March 2000, University of Washington Press. Washington USA ISBN: 0-295-97596-2
Ellie Whitney, D. Bruce Means and Anne Rudloe; 2004, Pineapple Press, Florida USA
ISBN-10: 1561643084
Oscar Scherer State Park 1843 S. Tamiami Trail, Osprey, FL 34229
[Ed. At present there is still some uncertainty about the precise range of plants constituting the Clematis repens complex. Dan Hinckley (of Heronswood Nursery, USA) picked seed from a plant in Emei Shan, Sichuan, China, in 1996, and it was the progeny of this seed collection that first brought this spectacular Clematis form to light, in the western world. I just wonder what must have gone through Dan’s mind when he first caught sight of this plant in flower and seed – it must have been a quite astounding experience. Since then, various other generally similar, but slightly different, plants have been introduced into circulation, from later seed collections and other sources. What isn’t in dispute is that the unique style of flowering display of these plants is enough to excite any plant lover, so, despite the lack of a full understanding of the group, a specimen of this tribe is, without any doubt, a ‘must have’ for any clematis fan.]
Plants of the Clematis repens persuasion
JJust last year I finally acquired a plant from this fantastic clematis group and, I must say, it has been well worth waiting for! The stunning yellow flowers are completely fascinating, and delightful; I would strongly recommend anyone to give it a try, if the opportunity arises. To finally see those delectable flowers, in the flesh, after years of drooling over other growers’ images, has been a long and greatly anticipated pleasure.
The plants hail from China and the first examples were raised from seeds collected in Sichuan, in 1996, by Dan Hinckley. I think Victoria Matthews’ description, in The International Clematis Register and Checklist: First Supplement, is a good general summary and, in these excellent images, kindly supplied by Garry Gaunt, most of the features cited by Vicki are clearly visible.
Clematis repens is a deciduous plant which can become slightly woody at the base, in the UK, if it finds itself in the right spot with propitious conditions. When the time is
right, the grooved stems emerge and soon begin to elongate rapidly, creeping silently along the ground, scrambling here and there, finding their way into and among bushes or through or onto any convenient host. If planted in a suitable spot, the vines produce copious amounts of foliage and, what’s more, quickly attain 4 to 5 metres in length.
The leaves are initially a darker green, with some gradually fading to mid-green. They are variable in form, mostly simple or 3-lobed, sometimes ternate, with a thin, papery appearance and feel. The margin of each leaflet bears two or three teeth, each with a pointed tip. Despite the slender appearance, the foliage is deceptively tough and resilient.
The excitement starts to mount when the flower buds begin to appear. They are borne singly, in the leaf axils, and enlarge steadily, on rapidly elongating stems. Each flower stalk possesses a small pair of leafy bracts, quite close to the base. The buds develop a slightly waxy look about them and before long, hanging down like bright little plumb
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bobs on stalks as much as 8 to 10cm in length, they are soon ready to open. Flowers are produced in considerable number, so the plant is rapidly awash with eye-catching golden yellow slender bells, which completely steal one’s attention. They are very beautiful, and distinctive, about 2-3cm long and 1.5 to 2cm across, sometimes a little larger all round. Each bloom is made up of four fleshy yellow sepals; these are oval or even a little more flattened –almost lanceolate– in shape, with sharply pointed tips. When the flower is fully open, the sepal tips recurve backwards somewhat, displaying more of the interior of each bloom: you can see straightaway that the inside margins are slightly hairy, and this continues all the way down to the tips. The stamens are about two thirds as long as the sepals and are quite numerous; they are packed closely together, filling the interior of the flower; the whole mass of anthers and connectives is covered in dense hairs. Once fertilisation has occurred, the sepals fall away and the flower begins its renovation into a seed bearing structure. Each tiny achene (when mature about 3 x 2mm) develops a long, feathery and protruding style, and the forming seed head then undergoes the usual rapid clematis type conversion, transmuting itself into a ball of tightly packed seeds, cocooned at the centre of the fluffy whorl. With maturity, the styles slowly lighten in colour and become wispy and softer to the touch. Once fully mature, the tiny seeds begin to come away in ones and twos; blown off on the wind or washed to ground by falling rain.
Encountering the Viorna Group on my Botanizing Travels, USA
Peter Zale USA zale.6@buckeyemail.osu.edu
rowing plants from seeds is one of the most rewarding undertakings to be had by gardeners of any persuasion. Raising plants from seed of one specific species, when the seeds have been obtained from various sources (differing in provenance), can be particularly intriguing, in light of the natural variation that exists in many species. It is the best way to get to fully understand the range of form of a species. Whilst my training and career path are in horticulture, my personal botanical interest centres around growing species plants. I have a zeal for botanizing and collecting seed out in the field, near and far; this past year (2013) I was fortunate to be able to travel widely in the U.S., solely for botanical study and enjoyment purposes. While the primary intention of these travels was to search out and study Phlox, there were many other botanically interesting and ornamental plants that were
encountered, by chance, along the way. One genus of plants that was a frequent and exciting surprise was Clematis It all started on the Edwards Plateau of Texas. As we traversed the rugged terrain of Lost Maples Natural Area, we caught our first glimpse of Clematis ← texensis peeking out from the base of limestone outcropping. As we moved deeper into the canyon, we found C. texensis growing in boulder bars and scrambling over stunted shrubs. These plants were larger and more floriferous than the plants growing in shade. The brilliant red flowers set this species apart from other Clematis, and hold tremendous ornamental value. Although there were no seeds ripe, at the time, we serendipitously found a local native plant nursery (Natives of Texas Nursery) that was offering seedlings for sale. For those interested in the native plants of Edwards Plateau, I highly recommend this nursery. During our visit, I was also able
to acquire plants of Penstemon triflorus and Phlox villosissima (Phlox pilosa ssp. latisepala).
Sometime later, during the dog days of late July, I was botanizing in southwestern Kentucky. While looking for the exceedingly rare Phlox pilosa ssp. deamii, we came across the demure Clematis versicolor. The two-tone flowers of this species are less flamboyantly coloured than C. texensis, but, of the North American Clematis species, they possess a
The Clematis 2014
quite unique charm. Fortunately we were able to collect some ripe seeds of this rarely grown plant. As if this weren't enough, an early autumn jaunt to the heights of Dolly Sods (a U.S. Wilderness Area in the Allegheny Mountains of eastern West Virginia) revealed a single, very large plant of Clematis occidentalis var. occidentalis growing amongst boulders. This species was scrambling along the ground – not climbing – in places clear of the stunted trees of the area. There were no flowers to be seen, but there was a surfeit of seed, and we were able to collect a pinch.
Finally, on the same trip, we also saw some Clematis species endemic to the ‘shale barrens’ of West Virginia and Virginia. These shrubby species are rare in the wild and even rarer in cultivation. The first species we came across appeared to be either Clematis albicoma or Clematis coactilis. This population was growing in the heavy shade of stunted Pinus virginiana; the seed had already dehisced; a second group was growing in a more exposed situation, in full sun. These plants had more stems, and were covered with ripe seed. We collected a small portion of the seeds (some of which have since germinated).
The abaxial leaf surface (underside) of Clematisversicolor
I close my article on a somewhat phonetic note. It is entertaining to consider the pronunciation of the word ‘Clematis’ , which is frequently the fodder of conversation. Whenever I am asked to weigh in on the subject, I say this: ‘because it grows upon a lattice, some people call it Clematis; but Mr. Webster won't cease to his, until you call it Clematis’
HHere at Hesketh Bank on the west coast of Lancashire, a very mild but wet winter, followed by an extremely hot summer certainly brought out the best in many of the National Collection Viticella Group clematis
The Collection, started in September 1997 with ‘Alba Luxurians’ , ‘Madame Julia Correvon,’ ‘Purpurea Plena Elegans’ and ‘Abundance’, now comprises one hundred and six different cultivars and species.
Some of this year’s most notable performances were produced by the following varieties:
‘Lavender Twirl’, raised by our BCS Newsletter Editor Jack Gittoes, has been in the garden here for only two years but it is already well established. This cultivar was absolutely amazing in the intense heat of July and August, with lots of bright lavender coloured flowers over a long period; it grows through a pink climbing rose, ‘Aloha’ .
‘Lavender Twirl’ is a stunning cultivar, with unique colouring. Jack raised this plant from seed from the BCS seed exchange in 2004.
‘Lavender Twirl’
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‘Hanna’ is neat and tidy, a very well-behaved member of the family – the pale blue typical nodding Viticella bells are perfect for the summer garden. Here, she is growing through a metal obelisk in a bed of herbaceous perennials, the pale blue contrasts nicely with the various pink Phlox paniculata and Monarda. ‘Hanna’, as is the case with several other members of the Group, is pruned twice each year; firstly in February, down to the ground, then in May we chop her down again to about two feet, this keeps the flowering plant at a height of about five to six feet.
In our garden a rose by the name of ‘Stanwell Perpetual’ is host to the charming ‘Melodie’, raised by Westphal in Germany. The rose is not fully perpetual –it has a flush of flowers in
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June, followed by a steady trickle in midsummer, and then starts flowering again in mid August; ‘Melodie’, with her soft pink flowers, obligingly steps in to bridge the gap – nice.
‘Perrin’s Pride’ is a super plant; the one pictured here is grown in a large clay pot which holds a metal obelisk. The flat, purple flowers have an almost perfectly circular symmetry about them and they are produced over a long period of time.
‘Jean Caldwell’ was raised by us here at the Hawthornes and is proving to be very popular. She is an open pollinated seedling from ‘Entel’ and is a good strong pink. The
‘Perrin’s Pride’
‘Jean Caldwell’
‘Jean Caldwell’
‘Danae’
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photos were taken on a very sunny evening in late July and show the intensity of the colour very well. The original mother plant, now in Jean’s own garden in the Lake District, is a few shades darker in colour.
‘Danae’ was raised in 1998 by Treasures of Tenbury and is believed to be a seedling of ‘Minuet’. This plant has proved itself a very unpredictable character, recently. Last year, much to our dismay, it went completely AWOL but this year reappeared, with a vengeance, completely smothering a trellis fence with beautiful flowers shaped very much like ‘Madame Grangé’. The plant then suddenly collapsed: whether due to the severe heat, or to overwatering, I don’t know but, after being chopped ruthlessly back to the ground, she is now, mid September, climbing the fence again.
The grand finale of the Viticella 2014 year definitely belongs to the Ernest Markham raised (in 1925) cultivar, ‘Blue Belle’, which is still showing a fair head of flowers, even in mid September. This plant is not for the faint hearted! Neither blue, nor a bell – but a very strong growing cultivar – John Howells wrote that she can get up to twenty feet in height. This is an ideal plant for abundant later season colour in the garden.
Charlie Pridham UK National Viticella Group Collection Holder
WWe finally decided to do something about a couple of problems that have been ongoing, over the last few years!
The first of them, clearly of our own making, was the question of what to do with all the seedlings that result from (what I always hope turn out to be) interesting crosses!
The viticella types are the plants I am interested in; they take a couple of seasons to flower properly and a bit longer to settle down and show their true colours. The last lot were taking up more than their fair share of tunnel space (Mrs P. didn’t put it to me quite so politely, at the time) and were so close together that I couldn’t tell which was which!
I decided (since I am the world’ s worst vegetable grower) to use one of the veg. beds, to line them out; I left them in their pots, half sunk into the ground and gave each a bamboo to grow up. Apart from them wanting to grow up each other’s sticks, it seems to be working well.
What has been a revelation is how different the seedlings are, in growth. The most recent batch all came from ‘Hanna’, a Swedish cultivar with rather nice blue flowers; some of her children are strong climbers, others are short and bushy. They are just starting to flower for the first time, as I write this, so, an interesting few months ahead.
A seedling from ‘Hanna’
Our second problem was as follows: in winter there always seems to be so many opportunities to plant clematis; once the spring arrives, though, everything comes back into growth and the combination of weeds and ground cover
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plants make the perfect habitat for slugs and snails! 2014 has been one of the worst years for them I can ever remember.
Another seedling from ‘Hanna’
Now, some clematis seem to cope with this level of competition and damage but others struggle – we have, on several occasions over the years, even ended up with plants (in our National Collection) that have failed to establish themselves properly. So with this in mind we invented the ‘Naughty Corner’. It’s an old cold-frame, with its base broken up and removed, then filled with the contents of our kitchen compost heap. With a complete absence of other plants to compete against, we hoped it would remove any excuse for failure. Five iron obelisks were put in place and then planted up, each with two of the above mentioned plants. It seems to be working and none have been shredded by snails. One or two have, however, of course, decided they would rather wander off into the company of our neighbours; also, I seem to be growing a grand crop of Sweet Peppers (and further, for some reason, Passion flowers?) And what lives in the small, neat round hole that has appeared in the compost, I know not! As the ‘Naughty Corner’ is behind our sitting area, we are getting to see, close up, several clematis that, though always present, have never really done much in the garden before.
Clematis Registered Between July 2013 and June 2014
Duncan Donald, International Clematis Registrar
IIaccepted twenty-nine applications for new clematis cultivar names in the second half of 2013 and the first half of 2014. Six of them were from the UK; the remainder from four other countries as follows: Poland 9, the Netherlands 8, Canada 4 and the USA 2.
Given the shock of his sudden death in March, I am very glad that Bernard Allen had earlier overcome what he described as years of equivocation over whether to name two 8-sepalled, Early Large-flowered seedlings he had bred back in 2004: reddish purple
‘Rosemarie Ann’ ↑ was named – of course – after his wife, while rose-pink ‘Laura Jayne’ → was named after his eldest grand-daughter.
New Leaf Plants introduced ‘Prince George’, a Late Large-flowered hybrid with 4-5 frilly, white sepals tinged pale blue, named in honour of Prince George of Cambridge, born 22nd July 2013. Richard Hodson, from Hawthornes Clematis Nursery, introduced ‘Lily the Pink’, a striking (‘Odoriba’ × ‘Alba Luxurians’) hybrid with pale pink flowers speckled dark pink. Charlie Pridham, from Roseland House Nursery, introduced Viticella Group cultivar ‘Tim’s Passion’ – with purple-blue flowers with a striking white bar – to commemorate landscape gardener Tim Powell. And Marcel Floyd added ‘Emma’, a reddish pink, Early Large-flowered cultivar with a white ‘eye’, raised from BCS seed from ‘Carnaby’.
The largest new group, of nine cultivars, came from Szczepan Marczyński, including several launched to mark his nursery’s 25th anniversary in 2013. All but two of these are
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Early Large-flowered, and four of those add to his set of semidouble or double-flowered introductions: ‘Azure Ball’, with pale blue-violet flowers, is due to be introduced in 2015; ‘Blue Explosion’ has blue flowers, its guard sepals tipped with pink; ‘Innocent Glance’ has pale pink, dome-shaped flowers; and ‘Maria Skłodowska Curie’ has white flowers, sometimes tinged green.
← ‘Emma’
He has also introduced three single, Early Large-flowered cultivars: ‘Blue Pillar’ has 6sepalled, blue flowers with contrasting white filaments and crimson connectives; ‘Stefan ← Franczak’ has 6 sepals, of a more intense blue and wavy-edged, with green connectives; and ‘Viva Polonia’ has 6-8 magenta sepals, with flashes of white at the base of the bar. The other two cultivars come from Flammula Group: terniflora ‘Early Snow’ is a vigorous clone of the species, raised from seed collected from the wild in Japan; and ‘Sweet Summer Love’ is somewhat akin to terniflora but with velvety flowers deep purple to red inside, pale pink outside.
Ton Hannink has registered six seedlings. Two are crispa hybrids: ‘Blue Cover’ is an Integrifolia Group cultivar with 4, outwardfacing, violet sepals; and ‘Hazel’ is from Viorna Group, with narrowly bell-shaped flowers, red-purple inside and predominantly pinkish white outside. ‘Delightful Scent’ and ‘Scented Clem’ are both cadmia hybrids with scented flowers: the
‘Blue Cover’
‘Sparkle Plenty’ former with pale purple, upward-facing sepals and a broad white bar beneath; the latter with brilliant purplish-blue sepals. ‘Mrs Hardwick’ is a Montana Group hybrid derived from chrysocoma, with outward-facing, semi-double flowers and some leaf undersides
‘Vancouver Danielle’
‘Vancouver Morning Mist’
C.terniflora‘Early Snow’ ‘Hazel’
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suffused purple. ‘Seena’ is a courtoisii hybrid, with white sepals and contrasting, spreading, dark violet stamens.
Also from the Netherlands, Wim Snoeijer has registered ‘Da Yun’, a scented, whiteflowered Montana Group cultivar (probably montana var. montana) collected in the wild in Sichuan, China in 2009; and ‘Zostapa’ STAR OF PAKISTAN, a sport from ‘Star of India’ – a late, large-flowered cultivar with red-purple sepals with a red bar. From Canada, the Weins at Clearview Nursery have registered four of their 8-sepalled, Early Large-flowered “Vancouver” series which have already been on the market for several years: ← ‘Vancouver Sea Breeze’ has wavymargined, reddishpurple sepals which turn lavender with age. ‘Vancouver Danielle’ has purple sepals with a purplered bar; ‘Vancouver Fragrant Star’ has lightly vanilla-scented, white flowers with contrasting, bluepurple anthers; & ‘Vancouver Morning Mist’ has pale purplish-pink sepals with a darker bar (whitening with age).
Finally, the Friends of the Rogerson Clematis Collection in Oregon have registered two of their seedlings: ‘Barbara Houser’ is a koreana hybrid with deep reddish purple sepals and staminodes (4 of each), and contrasting, cream filaments; and ‘Sparkle Plenty’ is also Atragene Group with 4 reddish purple sepals, but with numerous staminodes, strong violet at first, ageing pale lavender.
I should always be happy to hear from anyone who has views on any aspect of cultivar or Group registration they might wish to share.
Except where stated, all images courtesy of the registrant. clematisregistrar@rhs.org.uk 16 Midtown of Inverasdale, Poolewe, Wester Ross IV22 2LW; Tel. 01445 781717
New BCS International Clematis Trials Grounds
Keith Shortland UK fusilier567@btinternet.com
M Members are aware that an Agreement was entered into between the British Clematis Society and the Royal National Rose Society for a new Clematis trial ground at the Royal National Rose Society’s estate near St. Albans. Growers and breeders – amateur and commercial – are invited to submit plants for evaluation. Non-climbing types of Clematis are also welcome; they will be grown between the obelisks. Plants should be provided in 2-3 litre containers and three specimens of each cultivar is advised. Plants are scrutinised over two or three years, for garden worthiness. Our volunteer judges assess each plant and give a mark out of ten points, every time they visit the site throughout the year. The scores over the two or three years are added together and then converted into a percentage of the total possible score. A ‘Certificate of Merit’ is awarded where 80% or over is achieved. A ‘Commended Certificate’ is awarded where 70% or over is gained.
The 2014 trial occupies ten obelisks, interplanted with herbaceous varieties. Planting out started in late March with our very first contribution, a Heracleifolia Group plant. All the other new plants that have arrived
since have now been bedded in; I was ably assisted in the task by Everett Leeds and Paul Dunstan. As of October 2014 we are expecting to trial one Montana, four large-flowered hybrid plants, three Viticellas, one Texensis-type and the abovementioned Heracleifolia.
A group of fourteen volunteer judges has been established. Everett and I weighed the situation up and decided that because of the youth of the plants, and the time they would need to get properly established, there was no need, at this early point, for any judging.
I visited the Trial Grounds again on 1st May, a rather wet day, but no wind and not too cold. With the exception of the Montana, which had completed its flowering, the other plants’ modest development still did not, as yet, justify the judges turning out. As the year has gone on, however, the plants have developed rapidly and we are now seeing some good flowers on most of them, even in this very first season. Please contact me on the above email if you would like to enter your plants into the BCS Clematis Trials.
LADDER ROPE IS EASY TO USE. TO ATTACH LADDER ROPE STAPLE ONE END TO FENCE OR POST. ALTERNATIVELY CUT THROUGH THE TOP THREE RUNGS, THEN TIE OFF TO A NAIL OR PEG ON YOUR FENCE.
THEN CUT THE LADDER ROPE TO DESIRED LENGTH ALLOWING AN EXTRA 50MM.TO BE COUNTERSUNK. USING SOMETHING SIMILAR TO A TENT PEG INSERT THROUGH LADDER ROPE AND PUSH INTO THE SOIL.
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