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Re: Dodonea viscosa

D. viscosa is also indegenous to Hawaii.  At one time they (the
taxonomists) thought there were several species.  It seems very
enviromnetally plastic.  In somelocations it gets to be a huge tree, well
over 20 feet tall. In others it is a sprawling shrub (especially in the
winswept leeward areas).  Seed capsules, coloration, etc  varied depending
on onthe environment.  If removed from the environment they remained the
same suggesting that there were populations or forms that were localized to
certain environments.   I have noticed that the leaf color seemed to vary
in response to relative nutrition of the soil.  The ammount of red seemed
to be inverse to the ammount of availible nitrogen. Might also have
something to do with the high iron and alluminum oxide concentrations in
our soils, much like the hydrangia and blue or pink flowers.

	I suspect that seed propagated plants might not be true to form as Iam not
too sure if they naturally self pollinate....

MTF

At 09:34 AM 9/14/98 -1000, you wrote:
>At 04:41 PM 9/11/98 +1200, Tony & Moira Ryan wrote:
>>My purple Dodonea is always producing coloured seedlings in my nearby
>>rockery and if I can be bothered, I pot them up and give them to
>>friends.
>>
>>Having said that, my tree is an old one now (around 30) and does not
>>appear to be as rich a colour as modern cultivars, which makes me think
>>there has been some vigorous selection going on.
>>
>>So- you should certainly get purple forms from seed from a coloured
>>tree, but they may or may not be as good/better than the one you started
>>with. Worth a try, if they are free anyway.
>>
>>I suppose the purple forms may turn green in shade, but I think it might
>>have to be pretty dense to produce this effect. However, they always
>>look their best in full or nearly full sun.
>
>There are indeed some new, selected forms of D. viscosa with deeper
>purple foliage - very nice.  But I also like the other 'shades' as well
>in some situations.  One garden I know of has several seedling grown
>plants forming an informal hedge, shading in and out of purple and 
>greenish-purple forms (some of them quite pale).  There is more
>interest created by this variation, especially when they produce their
>fruit, which also ranges in shades from pale greenish pink to darker
>mauve or dusty pinks.  There is also some variation in height and
>overall shape and density.
>
>If a more uniform hedge is desired, it is definitely important to choose
>a clonal propagated group of plants
>
>Sean A. O'Hara                       sean.ohara@poboxes.com
>h o r t u l u s   a p t u s          710 Jean Street
>'a garden suited to its purpose'     Oakland, CA 94610-1459, U.S.A.
>
>
Mach T. Fukada, Web Master
fukada@hawaii.edu
Honolulu Aquarium Society
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Meadows/2948/HASF.html
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