Ask John Negus
Q Could you please name these two trees for me? I bought them some time ago and have forgotten what they were called! I have looked in several tree books and cannot find them. One tree develops this strange ‘fruits’ and changes colour in autumn. The other one has little flowers in the bit tucked inside the stem of the leaf where it joins the trunk and later has this little green fruits. Fascinating!
Homera Wood (via email)
A The first is clearly a yellow-flowered wintersweet, botanically Chimonanthus praecox, which starts blooming in December. The strange little bottle-like growths are seed vessels.
There are two varieties: ‘Grandiflorus’, whose blooms are deeper yellow, with a red-stained throat, and ‘Luteus’, with clear-yellow flowers that don’t open until February and whose blooms do not have a stained centre.
I suggest that when seeds are ripe you mix them with a little damp peat-free compost in a plastic bag and put them in the fridge for six weeks. Then sow them thinly, just covered with perlite. If you consign seeds to a coldframe or somewhere similar, and keep the compost damp, germination should occur within six months.
The other plant is a dogwood (cornus). There are several species and varieties. Some are small bushes, others large trees. If you can tell me more about your dogwood – does it flower or are you growing it purely for its coloured bark? – I will help name it for you.
I am pleased that you told me that the dogwood has tiny yellow flowers. That means it is almost certainly Cornus mas, also known as Cornelian cherry. Blooms are followed by red cherry-like fruits.