Varieties
There are at least two well-marked geographical forms, var. japonica and var. Fortunei, which will perhaps be ranked as distinct species, when the trees are studied in the wild state. Other varieties, which have probably arisen in cultivation, are distinguished by peculiarities of the foliage.
1. Var. japonica, the type described by Don from Japanese specimens collected by Thunberg.—This is the form which occurs wild in Japan. The tree is pyramidal in habit, with straight, spreading branches and short, stout, dark green leaves. The cones are composed of numerous scales, bearing long acuminate processes, and showing long points to the bracts, making the outer surface of the cone very spiny, especially towards the summit. There are generally 5 seeds to each scale.
2. Var. Lobbii.[1]—Tree narrow, pyramidal in habit, with short branches densely ramified. The leaves are long and light green in colour. The cones are like those of the preceding variety, but with the processes and tips of the bracts even longer and more slender. This is perhaps a geographical form, occurring in Japan, where it was collected by Wright. It has certainly proved hardier than the Chinese variety both in this country and on the Continent.
3. Var. Fortunei[2] or sinensis.[3]—A tree diffuse in habit, with deflexed branches and long, slender branchlets. Leaves long and slender. Cones with fewer scales (about 20), which end in short processes, the tips of the bracts being of no great length, so that the whole cone looks much less spiny than that of the Japanese forms. Seeds fewer, often only 2 on a scale, but apparently indistinguishable from those of the Japanese trees. This is the form which occurs wild in China, and which was first introduced into this country. It was described by Sir W.J. Hooker[4] from specimens gathered by Sir Everard Home in Chusan. The Chinese form ripens its seeds three weeks sooner at Dropmore than the var. Lobbii.
4. Var. araucarioides.[5]—Branches deflexed, with the branchlets long, pendulous, and very distantly placed. Leaves small, stout, stiff, and curving inwards at the top, dark green in colour. Cones as in var. japonica, of which this is only a slight variety. It is described as a shrub or low tree; but this may arise from its being propagated from cuttings. Large trees occur, of a similar habit, which seem, however, to be sports from var. Fortunei.
5. Var. pungens.[6]—Leaves straight, stiff, spreading, darker green, and more sharply pointed than in common forms. I have not seen cones; and the origin of this variety is not clearly known.
- ↑ Gordon, Pinetum (1858), p. 54.
- ↑ Cryptomeria Fortunei, Hooibrenk, Wien. Jour. für Pflenzenkunde (probably meaning: Wiener Journal für das gesammte Pflanzenreich; Wikisource ed.), 1853, p. 22.
- ↑ Cryptomeria japonica, var. sinensis, Siebold, l.c. 49.
- ↑ Hooker, loc. cit. He points out the difference in the cones of the Chinese and Japanese trees, but says that they are undoubtedly one species. Bunbury, Arboretum Notes, 172, remarks that the cones of the Barton tree, from Chinese seed, are very different from Don's figure of Japanese cones.
- ↑ Carrière, Traité Gén. Conif. (1867), p. 193.
- ↑ Hort. A sub-variety of this, pungens rubiginosa, is mentioned in Garden, iii. 1873, p. 322. The leaves are said to assume a coppery or tawny red colour from August until April.
