Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Pink Cascade Locust Trees

 

Am I alone here or did you ever wish you had a little more acreage so you could grow all of the beautiful spring flowering trees?

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Well I think about this every time I see a beauty like the one we saw last spring at the Dawes Arboretum. They had so many  trees that I had never seen before or quite frankly even knew about.

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As we drove along one of the roads in the arboretum this tree with beautiful cascading purple blooms stood out among all of the rest.

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Casque Rouge”  Cascade Locust Tree

Robinia x slavinii 'Casque Rouge' is an open, rounded deciduous tree with spiny branches and pinnate leaves made up of many mid green leaflets. Long drooping clusters of large deep pink or purple flowers appear in late spring and are followed by long brown seed pods in the autumn.

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This common Black Locust tree is anything but common and I would love to have room for one in my yard just for the blooms.
It grows best in moist, well drained fertile soil but it does tolerates poor soils and droughts.
It will grow in full sun or partial shade so it is not s fussy tree.
The flowering season is in late spring from May to June, according to the weather conditions, when it displays these long drooping clusters of purple flowers.
I know the bees were flocking to its blooms as they do the Honey Locusts trees along the woods around my home.

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Locust Borer and Leaf Miner

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Black Locust trees grow quite well in our poor hard clay soil. But we have had our Black Locust trees invaded by the Locust Borer and Leaf Miners.  I  saw the damage these bugs can do on a trip about twenty years ago to Pennsylvania. Their trees had browning leaves all along the hillsides where they grew.   I then watched them spread to start killing the Black Locust trees in eastern Ohio and Holmes county in the Amish country area of the state while on visits there over the years. And now I see the Locust Borers and Leaf Miners are here in the hills in numbers that are killing our Black Locust trees in the Hocking Hills area. Every summer now their browning leaves can be seen in numbers in the surrounding forest and park areas. So this beautiful Pink Cascading Locust would be vulnerable to them as well without treatments being applied.


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I am hoping that we can get back up  to visit the Dawes Arboretum again to see the Azalea’s and Rhododendron’s in bloom.

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Everyone have a wonderful week and….

Happy Gardening,

Lona

 

10 comments:

sharon said...

what beautiful trees....My sons live in the Amish county I will ask him about this

VW said...

That is a lovely tree! And yes, I am constantly wishing I had more space for flowering trees, though when I get overwhelmed with the gardening work I'm glad I don't have any more space to cultivate, LOL.

Gardener on Sherlock Street said...

Hubby and I are constantly saying, "if we bought our neighbor's lot, we could plant that tree." Ha! Beautiful.

Sunray Gardens said...

I see so many trees I would love to have but as you know, we can only do so much with limited space. That is a pretty one though.
Cher Sunray Gardens

GRACE PETERSON said...

Hi Lona,

This is definitely a tree I would love to have. The seed pods don't appeal to me but those luscious flowers and the pinnate leaves--ooh, la, la.

I hope botanists can find a predator for the borer and miner. Such a shame to see this kind of devastation.

I too hope you can get back to the arboretum. They're so educational.

Janneke said...

What a beautiful Robinias you have there around. O I should like to have lots of acres of land, because there are so many beautiful trees. One luck, we can visit arboretums to see them.

Giga said...

To smutne, że takie pięknie kwitnące drzewa atakuje szkodnik. Mam nadzieję, że zostaną uratowane. Miło mi , że pamietasz o mnie, mimo iż nie jesteś moim Obserwatorem na stałe. Pozdrawiam.
It is sad that such a beautiful flowering tree pest attacks. I hope you will be saved. I'm glad you remember me, even though you're not my permanent observer. Yours.

Nadezda said...

Lona!
Black Locust trees is nice in spring time.
It's pity it doesn't grow here, too cold winter.
Have a nice weekend!

Andrea said...

Hi Lona, yes those are really lovely flowers. I wonder why we don't have them here when i think they have it in India. I read somewhere that they produce the pods where galactomannans are sourced from.

Anonymous said...

I have a neighbor who has one of those gorgeous cascading locust trees Lona & it really is spectacular in bloom. Sometimes I'd like a little more space but other times reality sets in & I realize I have more than enough for one person to take care of...