Cupressus cashmeriana Carr.

Sponsor this page

For information about how you could sponsor this page, see How You Can Help

Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Cupressus cashmeriana' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/cupressus/cupressus-cashmeriana/). Accessed 2024-12-03.

Genus

Cupressus

Synonyms

C. funebris var. glauca Mast.

Other taxa in genus

Glossary

glaucous: Grey-blue often from superficial layer of wax (bloom).
globose: globularSpherical or globe-shaped.
variety: (var.) Taxonomic rank (varietas) grouping variants of a species with relatively minor differentiation in a few characters but occurring as recognisable populations. Often loosely used for rare minor variants more usefully ranked as forms.

References

There are no active references in this article.

Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Cupressus cashmeriana' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/cupressus/cupressus-cashmeriana/). Accessed 2024-12-03.

Despite the ravages of several storms this remarkable Cupressus cashmeriana growing on Isola Madre, Lake Maggiore, Italy, remains the most remarkable specimen in Europe. It is isolated on a lawn to the north of the Palazzo Borromeo. June 2021. Image Tom Christian.

A fine example of this remarkable cypress grows in the Temperate House at Kew, but when tried out-of-doors in even a very sheltered place, it has never recovered from the effects of the first winter. Its spray is perfectly pendulous, very glaucous, and flat, the branchlets hanging vertically in two opposite ranks. Leaves intermediate in character between the juvenile and adult states of the true cypresses; they are only 1⁄16 to 1⁄12 in. long, but are not scale-like, and have free, somewhat spreading points. Cones about 1⁄2 in. diameter, globose; scales ten, with a triangular, hooked boss in the centre. This cypress is, no doubt, of Asiatic origin, but there appears to be no evidence that it is a native of Kashmir. Henry suggested it may be a juvenile state of C. torulosa. It is a tree of singular beauty both in form and colour. The finest tree in Europe is on Isola Madre, Lake Maggiore, Italy. Cones are freely borne by the tree at Kew, and young plants have been raised from the seed.

In the mildest parts it has proved tolerably hardy, but seems to need more summer heat than our climate can offer. The tallest example known is at Headfort, Co. Meath, Eire; planted half a century ago it now measures 28 × 5 ft (1966). In Northern Ireland there is a specimen at Castlewellan measuring 22 × 13⁄4 ft (1966), planted in 1946.

From the Supplement (Vol. V)

The tree in the Temperate House at Kew had to be removed when the structure was renovated recently, but there is a propagation from it in the North Wing.

specimens: Mount Stewart, Co. Down, 34 × 31⁄2 ft (1976); Cockington Court, Torbay, Devon, 60 × 5 ft (1984); Headfort, Co. Meath, Eire, this tree attained 40 × 53⁄4 ft by 1980, but is now dead.

C. cashmeriana is now known to occur wild in one locality of Bhutan. There is no doubt that it is closely related to C. torulosa, under which it was placed as a variety by Kent in Veitch’s Manual of the Coniferae (1900). This is the status accepted for it by Silba.

The bole of the largest Cupressus cashmeriana growing on Isola Madre. June 2021. Image Tom Christian.

Besides the famous tree growing on the lawn to the north of the Palazzo Borromeo, several single-stemmed Cupressus cashmeriana grow on Isola Madre in Lake Maggiore. These share the same foliage details of the larger tree and are likely cuttings from it. June 2021. Image Tom Christian.

The largest Cupressus cashmeriana growing on Isola Madre is now supported by wires. Isola Madre, Lake Maggiore, Italy. June 2021. Image Tom Christian.

The 'classic' glaucous, weeping form of Cupressus cashmeriana is not as tender as once thought, now surviving well in gardens in southern England, as seen here on Battleston Hill, RHS Garden Wisley, in March 2012. Image John Grimshaw.

Long pendulous side shoots of the classic blue Cupressus cashmeriana give it great elegance. Image John Grimshaw.

After a slow start, the Cupressus cashmeriana by the lake in the Greenwich Park Flower Gardens is now luxuriating in London's warm summers. Image Owen Johnson.

Cupressus cashmeriana in native habitat in the Dang Chu Valley, central Bhutan, March 2016. The large, isolated trees in the foreground would one have been in forest, but this was cleared long ago to create the upland pasture. Image Tom Christian.

Native forest dominated by Cupressus cashmeriana in the Dang Chu Valley, central Bhutan, March 2016. According to oral tradition the many standing dead trunks, bleached by the sunshine, were killed by a forest fire in the 1880s; the living trees mainly regenerated in the years following that event. Image Tom Christian.

The main part of the Dang Chu Valley in central Bhutan would once have been dominated by Cupressus cashmeriana forest, but this was cleared long ago for agriculture. A few sentinel trees, like this one on the edge of a farmstead, are all that remains. March 2016. Image Tom Christian.

Cupressus cashmeriana c. 64 m tall in upland pasture in the Dang Chu Valley, central Bhutan, March 2016. Note the tiny figures just infront of the tree. Image Tom Christian.

This impressive Cupressus cashmeriana was far from the tallest seen during a week's fieldwork in Bhutan's Dang Chu Valley, but it was probably the largest in girth. March 2016. Image Tom Christian.

Examining the extraordinary, hollow bole of an isolated Cupressus cashmeriana growing by a farmstead in the Dang Chu Valley, central Bhutan, March 2016. Image Tom Christian.

Bark on a mature Cupressus cashmeriana in native habitat in the Dang Chu Valley, central Bhutan, March 2016. Image Tom Christian.