Magnolias - the Root of the Problem

Table of Contents and IntroductionAfrican Violets: the Doyen of House PlantsAgapanthusAlstroemeriasAmerican SagebrushesAmerican WildflowersAndean Nymph - a pink mimulusAquilegias (Columbines)AuriculasAustralian AnnualsBellis Perennis (Daisies)Black-Eyed SusanBlue African LiliesBreeding DelphiniumsBreeding Fuchsias: Part 1: From SeedBreeding Fuchsias: Part 2: HybridisationBromeliads from SeedButterflies in Soy SauceCacti RaisingCampanulasChilean Bell FlowerChilly Treatment for Peruvian LiliesCollecting SeedConserving Annuals and BiennialsCosmosCucumbersCycads: Living FossilsCyclamen for IndoorsDahlias from SeedDamping OffErythroniumsF1 Hybrid - What Is it?F2 and Open Pollinated VarietiesFrom Obscurity to the Height of FashionGentiansGeraniumsGermination to Pricking OutGolden Impatiens - The StoryGrowing Alpines From Seed: Part 1Growing Alpines From Seed: Part 2Growing Bananas From SeedGrowing Cyclamen From SeedGrowing Eucalyptus From SeedGrowing Ferns from SporesGrowing Foxgloves From SeedGrowing Fritillarias From SeedGrowing From Seed: From Packet to SoilGrowing Hardy Ferns from SporesGrowing Hardy Geraniums From SeedGrowing Lewisias From SeedGrowing Magnolias From SeedGrowing Meconopsis From SeedGrowing Proteas and Related Genera from SeedHandling Small SeedsHardy Annuals: Part 1Hardy Annuals: Part 2Hardy CyclamenHardy SpurgesHelleboresIncreasing your Violas and ViolettasKeeping Records of Seed SowingLettuce - the Vital Part of any SaladLord Anson's PeaMagnolias - the Root of the ProblemMimulus from Seed to Seed in Sixty DaysNew Guinea ImpatiensOld-fashioned Sweet PeasOnions with EverythingPansies are not Difficult to Grow from SeedParsleyPerennials for American GardensPetuniasPhygelius - their cultivation and propagationPinks: Evocation of the PastPlants That Flower OncePrickly but NicePropagatorsRadishesRaising PalmsRaising PrimulasSalad Leaves - a lot to be desiredShow Stoppers Twice OverSowing SeedsSowing in Open GroundSowing to Feed our FriendsSturt's Desert PeaSweet Peas - Autumn SownSweet Peas - Sowing and GerminatingTall and HandsomeTechniques with Tiny SeedTexas BluebellThe Effect of Light on Germination and SeedlingsThe Nervous PeaThe Scarlet Welsh PoppyThe Search for the Yellow Sweet PeaToad LiliesTomatoesTreasure Hunt for TasteUnderstanding Latin NamesUnique Poppy (Mother of Pearl)Viability of VegetablesWeaning SeedlingsWill the Real Mimosa Please Stand Up

John Kelly examines the problems of the first years of a magnolia.

A walk in the forest in the south-eastern United States is always instructive. You learn, for example, to keep your eyes open for the occasional cottonmouth or raccoon. Moreover, if it is swampy, alligators might be lying in your path. The first has a poisonous bite, the second carries rabies, and the third will eat what is left of you.

Still, apart from poison ivy (which is all over the place), the plants are harmless. Magnolia grandiflora and M. virginiana tower a hundred feet above you and at their feet are thousands of seedlings. The floor of the forest is teeming with baby magnolias between one and two feet tall, and this seems to be the height at which those that are going to reach maturity become sorted out, as there are very few indeed that are taller.

The inference to be drawn is that seedlings growing under clear sky, where there is a good chance of a healthy maturity being reached, grow on without a check. Those under the canopies of existing trees simply fade out. What is interesting is that so many grow so vigorously to that certain height.

Many a magnolia in cultivation, by no means necessarily belonging to one of these American species, has grown beautifully for a few years, only to 'go back-wards' for a few more before quietly dying. Almost always, if it is possible at all to diagnose the cause, something traumatic will be found to have happened to it. Even if it was only slight. On the other hand, once a magnolia has reached a certain age or level of maturity, it is very difficult to kill and ancient specimens, even when thoroughly plagued by cavities and splits, have a hold on life that is quite miraculous.

Can it be that there is something in the makeup of these plants that prevents undue demands on the habitat by seeing to it that only those youngsters with the very best chance of reaching flowering and seed-bearing maturity survive? That even only slight trauma or the mere hint of a less-than-perfect germination site means doom, unless an event, such as the opening-up of a gap by the falling of a tree intervenes early on? If so, is the 'going backwards' phenomenon linked to it?

That all this might well be so is borne out by the tendency, widespread among magnolias of the taller tree type, to flower late in life. It is far from uncommon for species to flower only after they reach the age of fifteen or so, and some, such as M. campbellii, wait until they are thirty. Natural selection favours the offspring of trees that can afford to wait.

Although the hypothesis would take some proving (or disproving, come to that), it seems as good a theory as any on which to base good practice in growing tree magnolias. If one assumes that they are extremely vulnerable during, say, their first ten years of life, one is much less likely to go wrong in growing them. From ten onwards they can be, if not positively abused, then taken much for granted in terms of horticultural practice.

Assuming that all this is not too far from the mark, one then starts to ask whether it affects magnolias grown from cuttings. The trigger for this enquiry might well be the fact that magnolias flower much earlier in life if grown from cuttings than from seed.

However, this is because a cutting is a biological short-cut, and you might logically expect the age factor to behave in this way.

But a cutting has no roots and a whole new root system is developed, whereas stem growth arises from the stem tissue. Is the message carried in the root system? I do not know, but I do know that your young magnolia will 'go backwards' if traumatised whether it was grown from a cutting or from seed.

As I am not a scientist (something which must by now be obvious), I have no way of knowing if my ideas on the youth of magnolias are based on reality. On the other hand, as a gardener I am bound to react to my own observations. What is inescapable is that, since taking almost fanatical precautions to ensure the happiest childhood and adolescence possible for many young magnolias, yet having treated mature ones with a degree of cavalier inattention, my magnolia growing has improved out of sight.

I am certain that damage to the roots is harmful to magnolias of all ages and that it is lethal to young ones. When I say 'young' I am being vague, but I do not think nature is vague. Because of what I have seen on forest floors I feel there is probably a sharp cut-off age for each species, but I do not know what it is. Therefore I can only speak of 'young' and 'mature'. However, I am quite sure that no experienced gardener or plantsman will fail to recognise that one just knows when a plant has settled down and become thoroughly established.

Young magnolia trees, when only slightly root damaged, may well continue to grow for some years, What usually happens, though, is that the internodal distances on new shoots become shorter each year, sometimes becoming as little as one eighth of an inch in forms of M x soulangeana, and looking like fruit spurs on apple trees. The branches die back gradually until the whole plant gives in one day and dies.

The inability of the roots to grow because of physical barriers can have the same effect. A sticky, plasticine-like clay will be too much for the soft, fleshy roots, and top growth cannot be supplied adequately by the restricted, subsequently starved root system. Physiological drought occurs as more water is lost than gained. Similarly, plants that are allowed to move with the wind before their roots have dropped anchor can never begin to get out of the original root ball because it is moving in relation to where the roots need to go and any that make it are quickly sheared off.

Magnolias, brought in bare-rooted or otherwise from a distance (say from Holland to England) and given a year's field growth before sale, have been notoriously suspect in the past. Virtually merely heeled in, poorly staked if at all so that they were hardly ever still, and watered when the staff had time, they were containerised, sold, lovingly planted, dead and buried in just long enough for it not to rebound on the nursery concerned. No doubt this practice is now defunct.

If you were to ask a dozen experienced gardeners whether it is possible safely to move magnolias, six would probably say no, while the others would say that they had done so successfully. As long as the plant can be moved without damage to the roots, there is no problem, but an accident, such as can happen when the root ball suddenly cracks across, can be fatal in the long term. The supplementary question should be 'How long ago did you move it?'

It is another brick in the wall of one's ideas about magnolias to find that their seeds are short-lived. If they are stored for very long, germination will be sparse or may even not happen at all. The habitat is none the poorer when seeds that fall on less than ideally congenial ground die off quickly. If every seed germinated there would be a subsequent drain on the resources of the area. In the southern States this happens in places because the habitat is so homogeneous as far as germination conditions go that the ground is covered with teaming masses of aspirant trees.

Many species display seed dormancy. While liable to die quickly in uncongenial surroundings, the seeds may hang on for as long as two years before germinating when conditions appear to be good, This, too, is an indication of a species for which insurance against wasted effort has meant success.

Typically, magnolia seeds are borne in pods that look like crimson, warty sausages, The warts split to release seeds which may be bright orange (M. campbellii), maroon (M. x soulangeana), or something in between. Each seed is extruded from the wart and dangles, suspended by a mucous ligament an inch (2.5cm) or less in length. After a while the seeds fall to the ground.

Only rarely do you see self-sown magnolias in cultivation. Even though a tree of M. campbellii, dating from the middle of the last century, may drop many hundreds of seeds in a given autumn, you are unlikely to find any seedlings. With two such trees I never did during a dozen years. Inexperienced at first and fretting lest the seeds be lost among primulas, gunneras, rhuems, and other jungle. I asked an old gardener how to harvest the seed. I think he was a bit fed up with me, because through his quite charming stutter he replied, 'S-s-s-saw the b-b-b-bloody tree down!'

The seeds are embedded in a thin pulp. My own system involves lying the seeds out in the sun to bake. This loosens the pulp. I then sow right away. Germination is often generous, if not profuse, the following spring although, as I have already mentioned, it may take much longer. Bought seed may have been in cold storage, in which case its viability will be such as to allow a reasonable germination rate. However; it is likely to come to hand in spring and it is then as well to mix it with 50/50 moist peat and sand by volume in small plastic bags which are put in the refrigerator for 30 days at 1.5C in order to break dormancy.

One again, there is no scientific rigour behind this way of doing things. It works (well, it does for me) and results are everything in gardening.

Ideally the seeds should be sown individually in pots of loam-based compost. Most subjects have given me up to 20% better results in soil-less composts over the years, but magnolias are an exception. If a large number of plants are required, which is unlikely, you can sow in trays but you have to be gingerly careful with the roots of the seedlings.

When it comes to planting, sumps and impermeable holes in the ground must at all costs be avoided. Digging a planting hole into clay merely makes a prison cell for a plant.

Magnolias love leafy or peaty material to root into when they are young. The best method of providing this is to cultivate a square metre of soil, mixing in as much organic matter as possible with twisting thrusts of a fork. The process is something like making a very large cake. After this has been done and the areas raked flat, the planting hole is made in the resultant mixture, into which the roots will dive with the delighted relish of gourmets discovering Escoffier reborn.

A short stake, placed according to any of the modem practices that allow movement of the stem but not close to the ground, should be firmly driven in before the hole is filled. After all, you can't see where the roots are once you cover them, and it would be fairly daft to take all kinds of care in looking after your magnolia only to drive a stake into its heart as if it were some relative of Dracula. When all is said and done, a magnolia's roots are its heart.