Red Jade Weeping Crabapple
Malus x scheideckeri 'Red Jade'
This is another one from the missing pictures I discovered yesterday. I guess it is like finding a couple rolls of film that you never got developed, without any loss of quality. Again this is a shot from early May 2005.
Every time I post a picture I do research on the plant and try and find out something I didn’t know before. I have been growing ‘Red Jade’ for years and I never knew that the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens introduced it in 1953 (discovered in 1935). At #1497 it has the lowest plant patent number I have ever seen. It is a weeping Crabapple that can get to 20 feet by 20 feet. I have two specimens growing that are about 20 years old and only 8 feet wide by 8 feet tall. You can keep them fairly small if you keep after them. I do prune them at least twice a year and it is easy to make them the desirable mushroom or waterfall type of shape. Most years they don’t have fungus problems but some years they do seem to get it late in the season. The blooms are awesome starting out with the white and pink buds opening to all white flowers. The bright green foliage is handsome, also. It is definitely a plant that people comment on and kind of has a novelty factor. It can stand on it’s own as an elegant structural element. The fruit is red but I don’t remember seeing that much of it.
I won’t say much about the weather other than it's snowing as hard as it ever does around here. Since I live on the top of a long steep hill I can judge the road conditions by how fast the traffic is going by my house. Here is how I do it:
If the cars are going
0-10 mph: Forget it. Probably won’t make down the hill.
10-40 mph: Conditions are terrible, better not to go.
40-50+:Slippery but makable.
Nobody is driving by today.
3 comments:
I love the red buds and the white streaked with red flowers. Makes it look like it has two different kinds of flowers on one tree. About the durability of film. I read many years back that the writer of an article in a photo mag had found some very old film, at least 20 years by the expiration date. He decided to see if it was still usable and guess what? It was. It had to be B&W film tho. I don't think color film would last that long. But I've heard of color film and slide film lasting at least several years beyond the expiration date if kept in a cool dry place.
How do you keep the other crabapples you described at 8ft by 8ft? Are they different varieties or is that by trimming. I would like to have one it my back yard but I need it small, 8 by 8 sounds perfect.
Hi there anonymous,
This is a Weeping Crab apple so it is easier than some of the larger types to keep small. I start out with a smaller tree and then prune out any upward growth. Crab apples respond well to pruning and shaping. There are several other dwarf varieties like 'Sargent's' that are upright but stay small. The best time to hard prune is late winter but you can take off any errant growth any time of the year. Hope this helps. If you have more questions you can email me.
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