Magnolia Finally Flowers in Boston

The "Hope of Spring" Magnolia Finally Flowers in Boston Stephen A. Spongberg and Peter Del T~edici After a difficult start, Magnolia biondii from China flowered in the Arboretum for the first time in March of 1991. The spring and early summer of 1991 at the biloba, and Magnolia biondii. While we were Arnold Arboretum were extraordinary with eager to examine each of these in turn, and regard to the heavy flowering of many of the to document their flowering with voucher trees and shrubs within the Arboretum’s col- herbarium specimens and photographs, the lections. Nor was this phenomenon restricted first flowering of the last-named magnolia to the confines of the Arboretum, for across presented us with the opportunity to examine the Northeast crabapples, flv~y.riWg dog- the flowers of tills species and to fix its posi- woods, and other ornamental trees and shrubs tion in the classification of the genus T A _ _ _ _ _ 7 ’ »Ync~llrar~ an ~lwnr~~n~nr ~f 1-.lv~,-,.‘ ‘ly.y i ^..t_^.7 tvtu~ttVllCt. the season as outstanding. The relatively mild winter of 1990-1991 and the abundant rainfall Early History of the Species that fell during the summer of 1990 combined Magnolia biondii was first described by the to make the spring of 1991 an exceptionally Italian botanist Renato Pampanini in 1910 floriferous one. based on specimens collected in Hubei Not only was there an abundance of bloom, Province in central China in 1906 by the but many of the newer accessions at the Italian missionary and naturalist, P. C. Silves- Arboretum, some of which have been consi- tri. The plant was next collected in 1907, also dered only marginally hardy in our location, in Hubei Province, by E. H. Wilson, who was also flowered for the first time. Included in traveling in China on his first expedition spon- this group were two species of Sinojackia (S. sored by the Arnold Arboretum. Wilson’s rehderiana and S. xylocarpa), rare members specimens, one of which was in fruit, were of the Styrax family from China, Liquidam- studied by Arboretum taxonomist Alfred bar acaylcina, a recently described species of Rehder, and the two men named another new sweetgum, also from China, and Fortunearia species, M. aulacosperma, based on Wilson’s sinensis, a little-known genus in the witch collections. This new species was described hazel family named to honor the well-known and published in Plantae Wilsonianae in nineteenth-century plant hunter, Robert For- 1913, with the added note that it formed "a tune. Several members of the magnolia family shapely tree with many rather slender and also flowered for the first time, including a spreading branches and wealth of leaves:’ hybrid tulip tree that combines the American However, the late James E. Dandy of the and Chinese species (Liriodendron chinensis British Museum, a noted English authority on x L. tulipifera), Magnolia officinalis var. the genus, determined that Rehder and Wil- 19 Bloommg for the very first time at the Arnold Arboretum, the dehcate, creamy-white flowers of Magnolia biondm (AA #1216-77-B) were photographed on 29 March 1991 Photo by Racz and Debreczy 20 son’s Magnolia aulacosperma was the same cylindrica, a similar Chinese species, with M. species collected by Silvestri and originally biondii. named by Pampanini in 1910. As a conse- First Successful Introduction quence of his earlier description, Pampanini’s name, M. biondii, is the correct one for this To our knowledge, Magnolia biondii was first central and northern Chinese species, which successfully introduced into cultivation in is now known to occur in eastern Sichuan, North America by Professor Y. C. Ting of Honan, and Shensi provinces, as well as in Boston College in 1977 when he traveled to western Hubei, where it was first encountered Honan Province to visit his homeland and by both Silvestri and Wilson. Nowhere a com- relatives (Ting, 1977). Professor Ting had been mon tree and apparently occurring only as encouraged to obtain seeds of this elusive widely scattered individual specimens, it has Magnolia by members of the American Mag- the northernmost distribution of any Chinese nolia Society, and on returning home to magnolia with the exception of M. sieboldii, Boston after a successful trip-a similar jour- a species that occurs in eastern and northern ney the previous year had been curtailed by China and also in Japan and Korea. Its Chinese a severe earthquake-he kindly gave half the common name, wan chun hwa, means "hope seeds he had obtained to members of that for spring flower ;’ and refers to its early flower- Society and half to the Arnold Arboretum. ing in late winter to early spring (Ting, 1977). These seeds, accessioned as #1216-77, germi- Silvestri’s collection consisted of flowering nated in the Arboretum greenhouses in the specimens, and although Wilson procured spring of 1978, and twenty-seven seedlings sufficient fruits so that seeds were processed resulted. Cuttings taken from these plants at the Arnold Arboretum ~PPnl~p,~,,g~o,S neither ~~ere rooted in the summer oi i98i and dis- man successfully introduced the species into tributed to members of the American Magno- !’77~t,Vatinn in ,eractarn crnr~Anc T7olz.ae. (1~127 m vw,av.~y in im. j~iiil~ Vl 170G ~1JCI lICCIl(;1 1940) nonetheless listed its year of mtroduc- and Alexander, 1981). tion as 1908, but the seeds entrusted to Jack- The plant that flowered for the first time in son Dawson at the Arboretum greenhouses the spring of 1991 was one of the original seed- either failed to germinate or the young plants lings from lot #1216-77. It now stands nearly failed to grow in the Arboretum nurseries, and four meters tall and three meters wide. While there is no record of the plants having been it has a central leader at this point, there are added to the Arboretum’s collections. In this also several secondary trunks that will prob- regard, sometime before 1927 Wilson wrote to ably become codominant, suggesting that this J. G. Millais, another noted English authority particular individual will eventually become on the genus, "It is the only Magnolia I found a multistemmed tree. We cannot say whether in China which I failed to introduce into this condition is due to the genetics of the spe- gardens" (Millais, 1927, p.85). cies or to the fact that this specimen was Following Wilson’s failure, the introduction somewhat stunted in its development by of Magnolia biondii into cultivation in virtue of being grown in a container until Europe and North America became clouded 1984, when it was finally planted in the mag- by speculation, inasmuch as unsubstantiated nolia collection adjacent to the Hunnewell rumors of its existence in the nursery trade building. in England and its inclusion in collections in Canada, the United States, and Germany were Thxonomy occasionally reported (Savage, 1974; Kehr, Based on Pampanini’s original description, 1986). Apparently, these erroneous reports Magnolia biondii has been thought to belong were based on the confusion of Magnolia to the Buergeria section of the genus Magno- 21 Magnolia biondn in bloom on 29 March 1991. The plant is just over four meters (ten feet) tall and looks as if it will become multistemmed over time. Photo by Racz and Debreczy. 22 lia, a group of five species restricted to eastern Asia characterized by the precocious appear- ance of the flowers in spring before the foliage and by an outer whorl of three very small, often early-deciduous, sepal-like tepals. How- ever, the lack of flowering specimens of M. biondii in western herbaria (other than Silves- tri’s in the herbarium in Florence, Italy) has left the question of sectional placement ten- tative. While most magnolia enthusiasts have accepted Pampanini’s description as correct, uncertainty has remained, especially on the part of those who prefer to see evidence first- hand. This uncertainty was compounded when August Kehr reported that scion material of M. biondii that he had received from the Magnolia Society distribution had flowered in his North Carolina garden in the spring of 1986, undoubtedly the first time the its native species produced flowers outside of A view of the stamens and gynoecium of Magnolia China. It turns out that Kehr had grafted the biondii. Photo by Peter Del Ttedici. scion onto a mature specimen of M. kobus, and that he could not dctcct the expected outer whorl of small sepal-like tepals on the Occasionally, the three small tepals do persist -fln~W arc r_"rn~"..o.7 .,."....,.. 1~., y ~li.i...... v, biaLm,u I~_.7 V1d11v,11t_ , Ii1C111,, aiter the wooiy bud scales have fallen, but 1986). rarely do they persist for more than a day or As a consequence, it was with great interest two. This fact easily explains Dr. Kehr’s obser- that we inspected the morphology of the vations of the flowers produced in his garden flowers produced by the Arnold Arboretum in the spring of 1986. plant for the first time on March 27, 1991. Other characteristics of species of section Suffice it to say that these flowers cor- Buergeria (particularly Magnolia salicifolia, responded to the requirements for placement the so-called anise-leaved or willow-leaved of Magnolia biondii in section Buergeria: a magnolia) are shared by the Arnold Arbore- whorl of three, linear, greenish-white tepals, tum plant of M. biondii and combine to con- each measuring about 10 millimeters in firm its sectional placement. These features length by about 4 millimeters in width, com- include the yellowish-green coloration of the prises the outermost whorl of tepals.

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