The Flower of Autumn Sun
I like this chance seedling because:
1. It has wavy petals similar to its possible parent Nodami Ushiro (unfortunately the seedling label was dropped, so I don’t know its seed parent for sure).
2. Is has small shiny leaves like Hiryu.
3. Elegant bicolor.
4. It has straight shoots with small internodes – nice to make bonsai.
I am going to keep and propagate this seedling.
Continue reading ‘Interesting small-leaved bicolor seedling yuri_panchul_2005_001_chance’
According to the book “Nippon Tsubaki – Sasanqua Meikan” (日本ツバキ・サザンカ名鑑):
Nokorika. 残り香 (Lingering Perfume), from Kumamoto Pref.
Deep purplish red occasionally with slender white streaks, single, medium, very early. Leaves elliptic to narrowly elliptic, medium. Upright, vigorous. The original tree survives in Kumamoto City, designated and named by Higo Sasanqua Society in 1968.
I like this cultivar. It has an interesting color, strong scent and general elegance. It is rare and I will keep it. I found it in Reagan Nursery in Fremont, California in Spring 2009. The container had a label “Belmont Nursery” which is somewhat puzzling since Belmont Nursery does not carry this cultivar (see their list of sasanquas). According to their website they carry only the standard set of sasanquas similar to sasanqua offering from Monrovia.
Another interesting thing about this plant – it is a “Higo sasanqua”. Many people know about Higo japonicas originated by samurai clan Kumamoto and promoted in the West by Italian horticulturalist Franco Ghirardi.
See also mention of ‘Nokorika’ in http://www5e.biglobe.ne.jp/~yoshii/sazannkahinnshu/hinnshu1.htm
Continue reading ‘Nokorika – a Higo sasanqua with a strong scent’
I decided to start writing down all seedling evaluations – even for very poor seedlings. I think it will help me to develop successful evaluation criteria.
I got the seed for yuri_panchul_2003_024_oleifera not from a plant in my garden, but from Camellia Forest Nursery in 2003. The resulting seedling was blooming first time 2009.09.02. The flower is a typical wild-type C. oleifera flower, nothing special. The bush shape is spreading, branches are flexible and have long internodes – this is not practical unless you plant to grow an espalier. Leaves are not shiny and way too large for my taste – the largest leaves are approximately 110×60, 100×60 and 90×70 mm (4.3 x 2.4, 4.0 x 2.4, 3.5 x 2.8 inch). The root system is pretty strong.
The plant was grown in somewhat poor condition – it was too dry during one of the heat waves that coincidentally happened during the period of active growth back in April-May. As a result some leaves are deformed. The plant is also root bound but this can be easily corrected by proper root pruning. There are some slugs living at the bottom of the container – this is natural because the container was standing on a plastic shelf lying on the ground. The damage from these slugs appear to be very minor.
The conclusion. This plant should be used as a rootstock during next February. The root bound problem can be corrected after 1 year.
Continue reading ‘Seedling yuri_panchul_2003_024_oleifera evaluation – unsuccessful’
I contributed some photo pictures to The Camellia Journal, a quarterly publications of the American Camellia Society (ACS). I made those pictures during the March ACS convention in Foster City, California. You can see one of the pictures published in the last issue of the magazine – a picture with the group of ACS attendies. I included both the cover of the magazine and the article about the convention below. You can see my other posts about the convention here:
Part 1. Bob Ehrhart’s Camellia Garden.
Part 2. Gallo Camellia Garden.
Part 3. Group pictures and the first reception.
All pictures are clickable:
A new book about camellias is published in China. It is written by Shen Yinchun 沈荫椿, a Chinese American living in the San Francisco Bay Area. I (Yuri Panchul) contributed more than 30 photo pictures to this great publication. The preface is written by Barbara Tuffy, a recent president of the American Camellia Society. American camellia people usually call Shen Yinchun “Y.C. Shen” or simply “Y.C.”
Continue reading ‘A new book about camellias is published in China’
Russian weekly “Novoye Vremya” (The New Times) published my article about the history of camellias in Japan, China, Europe and the United States.
Российский журнал “Новое Время” (The New Times) опубликовал мою статью об истории камелий.
http://newtimes.ru/articles/detail/3288/
To read my article in English using automatic translation by Google Translate, you can click here – http://tinyurl.com/mtroq5
Japanese – http://tinyurl.com/nzfn8e
Traditional Chinese – http://tinyurl.com/n2tegh
Simplified Chinese – http://tinyurl.com/npclos
Цветок на все времена
Романтическая красота и древность происхождения камелий стали источником множества мифов и загадочных историй, связанных с этой «царицей сада». В разные века камелия была символом и богини солнца Аматэрасу — прародительницы японских императоров, и символом Иисуса Христа, она олицетворяла то долголетие, то роковую переменчивость судьбы. При этом мало кто знает, что роскошный цветущий куст камелии — ближайший родственник чайного куста, источника экономического благополучия многих регионов Азии. Откуда взялись камелии и в чем тайна этого великолепного цветка — разбирался The New Times
— Сэр Джон поднялся наверх и принес шкатулку с драгоценностями. Когда я открыл шкатулку на столе и все собрались вокруг него, леди велела мне зажечь лампы в оранжерее, так как гости вскоре должны были идти смотреть красные камелии. Но красных камелий там не было!
— Я не понял вас.
— Они исчезли, сэр! Исчезли все до одной! — хрипло выкрикнул наш посетитель. — Когда я вошел в оранжерею, то так и прирос к месту, держа лампу над головой: мне показалось, что я сошел с ума. Знаменитый куст был в полной сохранности, но от дюжины больших цветов, которыми я восхищался днем, не осталось даже лепестка.
Шерлок Холмс протянул свою длинную руку за трубкой.
— Прелестно, прелестно, — сказал он. — Эта история доставляет мне чрезвычайное удовольствие…
Адриан Конан Дойл, Джон Диксон Карр. «Рубин Авас»
Маргарита бывала на всех первых представлениях и все вечера проводила в театрах и на балах. Каждый раз, когда давалась новая пьеса, ее наверняка можно было встретить в театре с тремя вещами, с которыми она никогда не расставалась и которые лежали всегда на барьере ее ложи в бенуаре: с лорнетом, коробкой конфет и букетом камелий.
В течение двадцати пяти дней каждого месяца камелии были белые, а остальные пять дней они были красные, никому не известна была причина, почему цветы менялись…
Александр Дюма-сын. «Дама с камелиями»
Камелии — самый яркий пример разницы в восприятии красоты на Востоке и на Западе. Если поставить рядом цветки, которые были популярны среди японских самураев, и те, которыми любовались английские аристократы XIX века, то может показаться, что перед нами совсем разные растения. Но и те и другие прекрасны.
Цветок самураев
Первое упоминание о камелиях относится к I веку нашей эры, когда губернатор провинции острова Кюсю лично прикончил главарей банды преступников дубиной, сделанной из древесины камелии. С тех пор эта часть Кюсю называется Цубаки по японскому названию камелии японской (Camellia japonica), а само поле битвы названо «Кровавое поле». Возможно, в названии отразилось то, что цветки дикой Цубаки — ярко-красного цвета, а первый в истории белый цветок этого вида появился только в VII веке и вызвал такой интерес, что его даже принесли показать императору Тэмму.
Continue reading ‘The history of camellias’
Below is the scan of the first book I ever read about Camellias. The book was called “Travels with houseplants”, it was written by Mykola Verzilin and published in 1973 in Kiev, Ukraine in Ukrainian language. This chapter was describing both tea plant and decorative camellias.
Continue reading ‘The first book I ever read about Camellias was published in Ukrainian language’
Continued from Part 1 and Part 2.
Back in March 19-21 I attended the annual meeting of the American Camellia Society. This year it was in Foster City near San Francisco. You can also read about the event on the website of the American Camellia Society.
At the end of the conference I made two group photos. You can click to enlarge:
I also made many photo pictures of the conference attendees during the first reception on March 19:
Continued from Part 1.
Back in March 19-21 I attended the annual meeting of the American Camellia Society. This year it was in Foster City near San Francisco. On Saturday, March 21 all the conference attendees went to the city of Modesto, California for the National Camellia Show hosted this year by the Camellia Society of Modesto. The show was in the Administrative Building of Gallo Winery. As a part of the conference we took a tour in the beautiful Gallo Camellia Garden and had a party inside Gallo Wine Cellar. You can also read about the event on the website of the American Camellia Society.
My photo pictures of the Gallo Camellia Garden, National Show and Gallo Wine Cellar:
Continue reading ‘American Camellia Society – 2009 Annual Meeting. Part 2. Gallo Camellia Garden.’
Back in March 19-21 I attended the annual meeting of the American Camellia Society. This year it was in Foster City near San Francisco. During the first day we went to the garden of Robert and Linda Ehrhart in Walnut Creek, California. Bob Ehrhart’s garden is one of the largest private collections in the United States. It has several thousand large plants growing mostly in containers. Bob’s website is www.camelliagrower.com. You can also read about Bob Ehrhart on the website of the American Camellia Society.
My photo pictures of the event:
Russian weekly “Novoye Vremya” (The New Times) published my article about the culture of tea in China and Japan. To write this article I asked several question one of the leading experts on genus Camellia – Professor Gao Jiyin from from Fuyang Institute of Subtropical Forestry, China.
Российский журнал “Новое Время” (The New Times) опубликовал мою статью о культуре чая в Китае и Японии. Для написания статьи я задал несколько вопросов одному из ведущих специалистов по ботанике чайного куста из Исследовательского института субтропической растительности в провинции Чжэцзян на юго-востоке Китая.
http://archive.newtimes.ru/magazine/2009/issue106/doc-60764.html
To read this article in English using automatic translation by Google Translate, you can click here – http://tinyurl.com/d6eues
Traditional Chinese – http://tinyurl.com/cggt7p
Simplified Chinese – http://tinyurl.com/cf7v35
Japanese – http://tinyurl.com/cf5lso
Религия чая. В Европе и Америке чай — всего лишь напиток. В Китае и Японии, откуда он пришел, — это великая культура и фантастически интересная история. Чем объясняются романтические чувства к чаю у китайцев и японцев — узнавал The New Times
Continue reading ‘The religion of tea in China and Japan’
Camellia sasanqua ‘Tai-shuhai’ 大朱盃 (たいしゅはい) meaning “Large Vermilion Cup”. According to Nippon Tsubaki ・ Sasanqua Meikan, Tai-shuhai came from Fukuoka Prefecture. The cultivar originated and named in Kurume in 1960s by Shunsuke Hisatomi.
I got the cutting of this cultivar from Nuccio’s Nurseries. When the plant started to bloom on January 20, 2009, I was amazed by the freshness of colors and the shape of its flower:
Although I don’t speak Chinese I was always curious to buy the book Monograph of The Genus Camellia 世界山茶属的研究 by Ming Tien-Lu (2000) since this is one of three main books about the botany of the genus Camellia. Two other books are A Revision of the Genus Camellia by J. Robert Sealy (1958) and Camellias by Chang Hung Ta and Bruce Bartholomew (1984).
And finally I found the book!
http://www.hceis.com/book.asp?id=1376
They also have a new book about sasanquas I was also looking for – Sasanqua (Cha Mei) 茶梅 by Xu Biyu and Lin Tianfei et al (2007).
http://www.hceis.com/book.asp?id=7319
Wow! Now I want to go to the nearby Foothill College to take an introductory course in Chinese (I was studying Japanese over there and it was very decent).
On January 25, 2009 I visited a well known camellia hybridizer John Wang, a Chinese American living in San Francisco Bay Area.
John Wang places camellias inside the house to hand pollinate them. Room temperature increases the chance of success and no insects can interfere. John does not believe in open pollination of camellias – he chooses parents very carefully because he cannot afford to plant thousands of chance seedlings like for example Nuccio’s Nurseries does:
This camellia hybrid, created by John Wang, is a seedling of Tama-no-ura:
Another seedling from John Wang has a rare yellow tint:
Continue reading ‘John Wang – a camellia hybridizer living in San Francisco Bay Area’
Camellia Forest Nursery is a nursery in North Carolina managed by Kai Mei and David Parks. Kai Mei is a wife of Dr. Clifford Parks (one of the authors of “Collected Species of the Genus Camellia”, 2005) and David Parks is their son.
Mieko Tanaka
The most interesting sasanqua hybrid offered this year is a true red ‘Mieko Tanaka’. Almost all previous “red” sasanquas were actually dark pinks (for example ‘Bonanza’ and ‘Reverend Ida’). The only previous true red was ‘Yuletide’, a chance seedling of Hiryu, originated in Nuccio’s Nurseries back in 1963.
The basic problem with red color is that wild C. sasanqua has no red (or pink) pigment – anthocyanin.
According to Dr. Takayuki Tanaka and other researchers, all pink sasanqua cultivars probably originated from an ancient C. japonica x sasanqua hybrid approximately 400 years ago almost definitely in Japan. The estimation 400 years comes from chloroplast genome DNA (cpDNA) analysis. Additionally, athocyanin chromatography demonstrates that all pink sasanquas (together with x hiemalis and x vernalis hybrids) share the form of anthocyanin with C. japonica and does not have pigments specific for C. reticulata and C. saluensis.
Based on this information, Dr. Tanaka was working on sasanqua-japonica hybridization and finally he developed a cultivar ‘Mieko Tanaka’ (C. x vernalis ‘Gaisen’ x C. japonica).
Plain Jane, O’Nishiki, Winter’s Rose and Winter’s Red Rider
Another important cultivar now available for sale in Camellia Forest Nursery is C. oleifera ‘Plain Jane’. This plain white flower has two distinctive quantities.
First of all, it is one of the most cold-hardy camellias, used by Dr. William Ackerman for his cold-hardiness hybridization program. For example, Dr. Ackerman claims that his cultivar ‘Winter’s Rose’ (C. oleifera ‘Plain Jane’ x C. x hiemalis ‘Otome’) can survive winter temperatures down to -15 F / -26 C.
Second, according to Dr. Ackerman, ‘Plain Jane’ may be used to create dwarf cultivars that are useful as patio and bonsai plants. Particularly, ‘Winter’s Rose’ is also a dwarf camellia. When Dr. Ackerman crossed ‘Plain Jane’ with C. sasanqua ‘O’Nishiki’, he got 3:1 mendelian ratio between normal and dwarf seedlings. This suggested that both ‘Plain Jane’ and ‘O’Nishiki’ carry heterozygous alleles of a dwarfiness gene. (Yes, I know that both plants are hexaploids – so an additional explanation from Dr. Ackerman is needed).
Luckily I got cuttings of ‘O’Nishiki’ last Summer from Mr. Garet Uemura who lives in Hawaii. Thank you, Mr. Uemura!
Continue reading ‘A new catalog from Camellia Forest Nursery, Fall 2008 – my review’
A Japanese-American nurseryman’s life in California: floriculture and family, 1883-1992
With Introductions by Julius Nuccio and Ernest Wertheim
Interviews Conducted by Suzanne B. Riess in 1992
The Bancroft Library
University of California, Berkeley
http://tinyurl.com/4ohuw6
Copy at http://sazanka.org/pages/toichi_domoto
This sasanqua cultivar, ‘Dwarf Shishi’, was originated by Toichi Domoto in 1988:
It is excellent for bonsai.
Also I found a very likely photo pictures of Toichi Domoto (need to check with Tom Nuccio) on http://tinyurl.com/4795g8. I am almost sure this is the same one (born 1902, high school in East Bay):
Continue reading ‘Found an interesting article about a Japanese-American nurseryman Toichi Domoto’
Camellia sasanqua ‘Nodami Ushiro’. Introduced by Domoto Nursery, California, 1934, but is originally from Japan. Stirling Macoboy believes that the name means “a backward glance” in Japanese, but he is probably incorrect. Since I cannot find this name in Japanese sources and my Japanese wife tells me that Japanese people are not likely to name a flower this way (”mi” meaning “body”), I guess that the original name was different. From browsing the history of Toichi Domoto I got an impression that he did not know Kanji well because he was a second-generation Japanese-American. Because of it, Toichi Domoto probably made a naming mistake when he imported it.
It is difficult to explain what is so special about ‘Nodami Ushiro’. It is a single pink camellia with a lot of single pink competitors – ‘Plantation Pink’, ‘Cleopatra’, ‘Tanya’ and others. However Jennifer Trehane in her camellia book calls ‘Nodami Ushiro’ “a subtle, sophisticated camellia”. Where does this sophistication come from? I have an explanation.
Continue reading ‘‘Nodami Ushiro’ – a Higo-like sasanqua’
This month The International Camellia Society put two of my camellia photo pictures to the front page of their website. One is a picture of Camellia japonica ‘Kamo Honnami’ (see their website), and another is a picture of Camellia grijsii, a species related to C. sasanqua:
C. grijsii
Camellia grijsii (长瓣短柱茶 in Chinese) Hance (1879) is a wild species of section Paracamellia. It is related to C. sasanqua, C. oleifera and C. kissii. It was collected in 1861 in Fujian by C.F.M. de Grijs. It is distributed in China (Fujian, Hubei, Sichuan, Guangxi) and used for a high-quality oil production. C. grijsii is closely related to another species – C. yuhsienensis, that is a parent of a popular cultivar ‘Yume’.
I got my two plants of C. grijsii from Nuccio’s Nurseries. The first one (shown above) has single white flowers and the second one is a double-flowered Chinese cultivar called ‘Zhenzhucha’:
Camellia grijsii ‘Zhenzhucha’
Camellia grijsii has great hybridizing potential. Two plants in my garden have small leaves with impressed veins and very columnar shape. I believe there are also varieties with larger leaves, but I am specifically interested in small-leaved cultivars.
Another great feature of C. grijsii is its cluster-flowering habit. However in my garden C. grijsii flowers from January to March, so it will be a challenge to cross it with Fall-flowering sasanquas. Probably I will have to store some pollen from sasanquas in refrigerator for a couple of months.
Another problem is chromosome number. According to Kondo and his associates it has a variety of chromosome numbers 2n = 30, 60, 75 and 90 (see the reference in Collected Species of the Genus Camellia, an Illustrated Outline by Gao Jiyin, Clifford R. Parks and Du Yuequiang).
Continue reading ‘Camellia grijsii’
I got two awards on 2008 National Camellia Show at Longwood Gardens, Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. I took part in photography competition.
The first photo picture is of species Camellia puniceiflora from section Paracamellia:
Camellia puniceiflora (粉红短柱茶 in Chinese) Chang 1981. A wild species distributed in China: Zhejiang, Hunan. Small leaves, grows up to 2 m (6 f) high.
The second photo picture is of sasanqua cultivar called Chojiguruma:
Chojiguruma, 丁子車 in Japanese. Means “a wheel of anemone” in Japanese. Introduced in 1789. Originated in Kansai, spread to many places. This anemone form is very rare for C. sasanqua cultivars.
The complete list of all results of the Camellia Photography Show is below:
Continue reading ‘2008 National Camellia Show at Longwood Gardens, Kennett Square, Pennsylvania’
