Gardening with Margaret Matthews
The beauty of weeping trees
by Margaret Matthews
Recently I was asked, "What are your favourite trees?". At first I thought, "What a silly question. It is impossible; there are hundreds of lovely trees!" But then I realised that all the trees that came to mind were weeping trees.
Perhaps this predilection for weeping trees is explained by what I would call a melancholy streak in my make-up. This means that I respond more readily to Wordsworth’s "still, sad music of humanity" than to Browning’s "God’s in His Heaven, all’s right with the world".
Weeping trees are often associated with grief and mourning. Especially the weeping willow and the ‘sad cypress’ as Shakespeare wrote of it. Cypresses, both upright and weeping, find their place in many cemeteries.
When we think of weeping trees, it is often the deciduous European trees which come to mind. But there are some Australian evergreen trees on my list of favourites. Eucalyptus caesia and E sepulcralis are most beautiful weeping trees, so don’t be put off by the botanical names. Both have graceful trunks, narrow grey leaves, and the former has pale pink flowers and silvery seed capsules. The Latin ‘sepulcralis’ is especially appropriate in the present context.
Unfortunately these trees are not especially at home in the southern states of Australia. They rarely achieve the perfection that they can reach in their native environment which is Western Australia. E caesia is frequently grown here, but it needs skilful planting and the right conditions to succeed.
Agonis flexuosa is another weeping Australian tree, also called the Willow Myrtle (there is a variegated form as well as the green one). There is a lovely weeping wattle (Acacia soborosa) in the village where I live. I visit it each spring and wonder why it is not more widely planted.
There are a number of bottlebrushes (callistemins), particularly C viminalis, which also have a weeping habit.
Of the exotics, Betula pendula ‘Youngil’, the weeping birch, would be my first choice. It is worth looking at in any season, even when its pale skeleton is swept by wind and rain. Salix babylonica, the weeping willow, beloved of Chinese poets and artists; a romantic and ancient tree. Its roots unfortunately have a habit of travelling great distances in search of water. It is better to admire the willow on river banks, in public gardens, or even on a decorative screen!
There are many species of maple in weeping forms. Some of the smaller Japanese maples, with finely divided leaves which turn scarlet in autumn, are often used as a specimen in a courtyard or, not surprisingly, in a Japanese style garden. I could include many other weeping species and, of course, there are ‘man-made’ weeping fruit trees and roses created by budding and grafting.
There are many weeping standard roses available. Two of my favourites are Seafoam and Renae, both of which flower several times a year. Weeping fruit blossom in spring once seen is never forgotten — apricot, peach, pear, mulberry. And, of course, cherry, which inspired the lines, "Loveliest of trees, the cherry now, is hung with bloom along the bough". All these trees are seen at their best when planted as specimens in a lawn or in isolation so that they may be fully appreciated.
Imagination and memory are essential ‘tools’ to the gardener – as necessary as secateurs, spade and rake. Through them we can create past springs and project ourselves forward into autumns still to come. I have no weeping trees in my tiny garden now, but memory enables me to see again many others, in distant gardens of my own, of friends, in other parts of Australia and other countries. I remember especially gardens in China, surely the place which comes first to mind when we turn our thoughts to weeping trees.
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