Drimys winteri J.R.Forst. & G.Forst.

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Credits

Roderick Cameron (2025)

Recommended citation
Cameron R. (2025), 'Drimys winteri' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/drimys/drimys-winteri/). Accessed 2025-04-27.

Family

  • Winteraceae

Genus

Common Names

  • Winter's Bark
  • Canelo
  • Canelillo
  • Canela amarga
  • Boighe
  • Foye
  • Saltáxar
  • Uk'ushta
  • Cannelle de Magellan
  • Écorce de Winter
  • Echte Winterrinde

Synonyms

  • Wintera aromatica Murr.
  • Drimys aromatica Descourt.
  • Drimys punctata Lam.
  • Drimys winterana Thell.

Glossary

family
A group of genera more closely related to each other than to genera in other families. Names of families are identified by the suffix ‘-aceae’ (e.g. Myrtaceae) with a few traditional exceptions (e.g. Leguminosae).
included
(botanical) Contained within another part or organ.
indigenous
Native to an area; not introduced.
lectotype
Specimen or illustration chosen to serve as the type specimen for a taxon in cases where one was not designated by the original author.
section
(sect.) Subdivision of a genus.
sensu stricto
(s.s.) In the narrow sense.
subspecies
(subsp.) Taxonomic rank for a group of organisms showing the principal characters of a species but with significant definable morphological differentiation. A subspecies occurs in populations that can occupy a distinct geographical range or habitat.
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

Credits

Roderick Cameron (2025)

Recommended citation
Cameron R. (2025), 'Drimys winteri' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/drimys/drimys-winteri/). Accessed 2025-04-27.

Shrub or small tree, 0.6–17 m tall. Bark fawn-brown to greyish, highly aromatic. Twigs finely wrinkled, glabrous, brownish or dark grey, 3–6 mm in diameter. Leaves leathery, dark green above, glaucous or paler beneath, usually obovate-oblong to elliptic, 6–15 cm × 1.8–6.5 cm, attenuate to obtuse at the base, obtuse or rounded at the apex, sometimes notched, margin slightly recurved, 5–15 veins either side of the midrib, midrib visible, secondary venation obscure; petioles 6–20 mm long, 1–4 mm in diameter, slightly swollen towards the base. Flowers usually clustered near ends of branches, scented, umbellate or single, peduncles absent or up to 50 mm long, pedicels 10–70 mm long; sepals membranous, broadly ovate to kidney-shaped, 4–7 mm × 4–12 mm, rounded at apex; petals 4–14, membranous, white or pale pink, oblong to narrowly obovate, 6–20 mm × 2–6 mm, obtuse at apex; stamens 15–40; carpels 3–10, obovoid or ellipsoid, 2–3.5 mm at flowering. Berry 3.5–8 × 2,5–5 mm, dark blue when ripe. Seeds 3–10 per berry, sickle-shaped, 3–3.5 mm long. (Smith 1943; Flora Argentina y del Cono Sur 2025; Dimitri 1959)

Distribution  Argentina Southwest (Andes Mountains) Chile Central and South, from Aisén to Tierra del Fuego

Habitat Nothofagus forests in damp, wet areas, near river banks, up to 1,200 m.

USDA Hardiness Zone 8a-9b

RHS Hardiness Rating H4

Awards RHS Award of Garden Merit 2002

Conservation status Least concern (LC)

Though now a darling of gardeners for its floral and foliar attractions, Drimys winteri first became known to European botany as bark. It arrived in England by the hand of Captain John Wynter (or Winter), who had sailed with Sir Francis Drake in 1577 on what was to be a circumnavigation of the world. The expedition had been reduced from five ships to two by the time it reached the southern tip of South America, and Winter’s ship was separated from Drake’s in a storm after they had crossed the Straits of Magellan, between the island of Tierra del Fuego and continental South America. Failing to encounter Drake’s ship, Winter decided to turn back for home. The decision might have been influenced by the fact that a short time before Drake had had a falling out with the third co-commander of the expedition, Thomas Doughty, and had him summarily tried for mutiny and decapitated on a Patagonian beach (Coote 2003). Aside from the undeniable health benefits of keeping his head on his shoulders, Winter’s decision paid an additional medicinal dividend. While tarrying in the Straits, Winter went ashore and was shown a tree whose bitter bark the indigenous people used to ward off sickness during winter when fresh fruits and vegetables were scarce. It proved to work wonders on Winter’s scurvy-riddled crew, and he collected an ample store of it to take back to England, where he arrived in 1579 (Taylor 1930). There it was adopted as a powerful medicine and became known as Winter’s bark. Drake would go on to sail around the world and loot not a few Spanish galleons on the way, but Winter’s name would be immortalized in the nomenclature of this plant.

Drimys winteri was not introduced to cultivation till two and a half centuries later, by which stage the taxonomic travails of this plant and its relatives were well under way. Though well known under its medicinal moniker of Winter’s bark, which was even rendered in Latin as Cortex winteranus, the plant would not be formally described till J.R. Forster and his son Georg published in 1776 an account of plants found on Cook’s second voyage of discovery (1772–1775). They described it together with a shrub they had found in New Zealand and which they considered to be congeneric with Winter’s Patagonian plant. They placed the plants in a genus they named Drimys. The Forsters honoured John Winter in the epithet they chose for the South American plant, and they named the New Zealand plant Drimys axillaris. Linnaeus had already misguidedly tipped his hat to Winter with the genus Winterana, which he applied to what he thought was a close relative of Winter’s bark but turned out to be the quite different Canella (wild cinnamon). In 1784, Johan Andreas Murray felt that Winter had been hard done by in not having a genus named after him, so he took matters into his own hand and published a new name for Drimys winteri, Wintera aromatica, stating in a footnote that the genus was ennobled by Winter’s bark and he thus preferred to call it Wintera rather than Drimys. The rules of nomenclature take a dim view of this type of bevaviour, and Murray’s name is judged to be a nomen superfluum and thus illegitimate.

This was not the last attempt to perpetuate Captain Winter’s memory in the name of a genus of plants. Van Thiegem in 1900 correctly separated out a section of New Zealand plants previously in Drimys into their own genus, for which he resuscitated Murray’s illegitimate Wintera, incorrectly claiming it had been validly applied by G. Forster (Jr.) in moving Drimys axillaris into Wintera in 1786. This flaw was fixed by Dandy in 1933 when he proposed a new name for this genus, Pseudowintera, thus maintaining at least a memento of the Captain’s name. Drimys was first lectotypified by De Candolle in 1817, who based his section Drimys on Forster & Forster’s Drimys axillaris, so Dandy’s new genus had perforce to retain the name Drymis, and the other species in Drimys would need to be renamed. To avoid what would have been a nomenclatural mess, Vink in 1969 proposed to conserve Drimys winteri as the lectotype of Drimys over D. axillaris, permitting the continued use of the widely accepted generic name. The cultural weight of Winter’s bark is reflected in the fact that the Captain is still remembered in the name of the family to which Drimys and other related genera belong: Winteraceae R.Br. ex Lindl. This was based on the type genus while it was still called Wintera, and though the genus name is illegitimate, the family name was conserved. The grouping under this name was first proposed (as Wintereae) by Robert Brown in a letter to De Candolle, and included in an addendum to De Candolle’s Regni vegetabilis systema naturale (1817).

The first appearance of Drimys winteri in plant form in England was in 1827 (Coats 1992, Edwards & Marshall 2019). By several accounts, the plants in cultivation in the UK and Europe seem to be var. chilensis (see below) rather than the typical variety. A.C. Smith (1943) distinguished the varieties as much by distribution as by morphological features. ‘The morphological tendencies within each of these varieties are not emphatic,’ he wrote, ‘but each variety is geographically restricted and shows a certain amount of incipient differentiation.’ The type is found south of parallel 42° south, i.e. southern Chile (from about Chiloé to Cape Horn) and adjacent Argentina. It would thus have been what Captain Winter found in Tierra del Fuego. Var. chilensis is found further north, but with a region of overlap: Smith defines the range to the minute, between 30°30’ and 44°40’, corresponding to central Chile from Coquimbo to Aysen. The variety was first described as a species by de Candolle in 1817. Asa Gray reduced it to a variety in 1854, but he was essentially following the opinion of J.D. Hooker, who in Flora Antarctica (1845) wrote of Drimys: ‘After a careful examination of a very extensive suite of examples, I have come to the conclusion that there is but one South American species of this genus. There is a dissimilarity in the form of the foliage, even between the North and South Fuegian states, the former having longer and more membranous leaves, differing in no respect from specimens gathered near Valparaiso…, which generally pass under the name of D. chilensis DC.’ Gray saw ‘little to militate against Dr. Hooker’s conclusion respecting the species,’ though he was sceptical of Hooker’s claim that Drimys comprised one species extending over 86° of latitude from Cape Horn to Mexico.

The typical variety tends to be taller, but with inflorescences of fewer flowers bearing fewer petals, so in horticultural terms it is the plainer sibling of var. chilensis. For Bean (1976) it is a horticultural non-entity: ‘Unless the typical variety comes into cultivation the distinction [with var. chilensis] is scarcely worth recognising in garden nomenclature.’ Hogan (2008) writes at length about the virtues of Drimys winteri (before devoting a paragraph to var. chilensis), but based on the locations he names he is referring to var. chilensis rather than the type variety. He mentions the plants reach their ornamental peak in prime habitat on damp west-facing slopes in central and southern Chile. And he describes plants he saw in Altos de Lircay National Reserve, which is at about 35° south, so clearly in the range of var. chilensis. He adds, however, that ‘[t]he more one observes the genus Drimys in nature, specifically D. winteri, throughout its range in Chile, the more one is likely to doubt exacting, presently accepted subspecies [sic] and/or varieties.’

Locally, the two varieties are recognized by botanists and reference texts (e.g., Dimitri 1959; Flora Argentina y del Cono Sur 2025; Fundación R.A. Philippi 2025), following A.C. Smith’s geographical and morphological demarcations. According to Martin Gardner (pers. comm. 2025), ‘the differences are minor and they represent the sort of variation one would expect with a species with such a huge north-south distribution.’ There seems to be scant evidence that the type variety is in cultivation, and Drimys winteri of gardens and horticultural literature is almost always var. chilensis. We describe both varieties here, in the traditional sense, covering cultivated plants under var. chilensis. We would be extremely interested to learn of cultivated material of var. winteri in the northern hemisphere.

The species is sacred to the Mapuche people of southern Chile and Argentina, who gather under their canopies to celebrate their assemblies and rites (Dimitri 1959). It is also gaining popularity as a niche spice, marketed as Patagonian pepper (Farina et al. 2023).

Though the perpetuation of John Winter’s name in botanical nomenclature survived the vicissitudes summarised above, it was almost shipwrecked on the shoals of mistaken identity. Starting with Clusius (1582) and continuing through Coombes (2012), several authors have attributed the name to Admiral Sir William Winter, John’s uncle. It is true that John’s appointment as commander of a ship in Drake’s expedition may have been due to nepotism (sensu stricto): Sir William was Surveyor and Rigger of the Navy, Master of Navy Ordnance, and one of the sponsors of the expedition. However, the credit for retrieving the medicinal bark from the uttermost part of the Earth is John’s alone.


var. chilensis (DC.) A. Gray

Synonyms
Drimys chilensis DC.
Drimys winteri f. chilensis (DC.) Eichler
Drimys chilensis var. latifolia Miers
Drimys paniculata Steud.
Drimys magnoliifolia Kunth ex Eichler
Temus moschata Molina

Differing from the type in size, leaf disposal, and inflorescences. According to A.C. Smith (1943), leaves are smaller, distributed more evenly along the branches, appearing to be more compact; inflorescences are umbellate, flowers very rarely single (single, very rarely umbellate in var. winteri), petals 6–14 (only 5–7 in var. winteri). Fundación R.A. Philippi (2025) indicates it reaches 20 m in the wild (30 m for var. winteri), but in cultivation height seems more in line with that reported by A.C. Smith: 3–15 m for var. chilensis, up to 17 m for var. winteri.

Distribution

  • Argentina – Southwest (Andes Mountains)
  • Chile – Central Chile, from Coquimbo to Aysen (rom 30° 30' to about 44° 40' S)

Awards
RHS Award of Garden Merit 2002

RHS Hardiness Rating: H4

USDA Hardiness Zone: 8

This variety merits more discussion than the nominate variant since it is the dominant rep[resentative of the species in cultivation. Bean (1976) writes that var. chilensis is what is commonly cultivated in Britain as Drimys winteri, and it is this taxon that William Jackson Hooker referred to in his 1854 description in Curtis’s Botanical Magazine. A.C. Smith (1943) confirms this, listing Drimys winteri sensu Hook. in the synonymy of var. chilensis. W.B. Turrill revisited the taxon for Curtis’s Botanical Magazine in 1953 with a beautiful illustration listed explicitly as var. chilensis. It is probably this variety that should take credit for the 2002 Award of Garden Merit, though it was nominally given to Drimys winteri.

Sean Hogan (2008) outlines the ornamental attractions of this plant, which forms a small shrub to a large tree, mentioning “thickly petalled, star-like white flowers … [that] hang off the ends the branches in numerous, fragrant clusters in early to mid spring, with an occasional autumnal after-thought”. Further interest is provided by the fruit that ripen purple to black, as well as the thick-textured leaves with glaucous to silvery undersides. Sean has grown several collections from Vilches National Park and further south in Biobío, and at Cistus Nursery (Portland, Oregon) has selected a form named ‘Mike Remmick’ with a statuesque columnar habit and particularly white leaf undersides (S. Hogan pers. comm. 2025). For Bean (1976) there are few more beautiful evergreens, “with their soft-green leaves, silvery beneath, and spire-like habit.” Nick Macer (2025) admires the “loose clusters of starry white flowers in May” and the magnificent, huge, ancient specimens growing in the wet gardens of the British west coast. At Caerhays it recovered well after seemingly fatal damage during the ‘Beast from the East’ (severe cold and heavy snowfall caused by anticyclone Hartmut in March 2018), leaving it with dead leathery leaves shrivelled and drooping on the branches: new growth appeared, and by the following spring it was flowering as usual. In Cornwall flowering occurs at the very start of spring in March (Burncoose Nurseries 2025).

According to the Hillier Manual (Edwards & Marshall 2019), two forms of what is considered to represent var. chilensis have been grown in Britain and Ireland. A form with broader leaves has long been grown in gardens in southwest England and Ireland as var. latifolia Miers. It originates from temperate rainforests and is a stronger-growing, looser-limbed tree with larger leaves. In cultivation in Britain and Ireland it is less hardy than the type or other varieties and needs protection. The second form grows in the wild in coastal, marshy regions, is more compact, almost columnar in habit, and has narrower, firmer leaves (Edwards & Marshall 2019). Bean (1976) suggests that var. latifolia has white flowers, in contrast to the yellowish flowers of the other form. Bean also devotes much discussion to this variety, mentioning plants in various gardens that do or do not display the characteristics that supposedly distinguish it, such as wider leaves, slenderer habit, or green stems rather than red, but in summary is inconclusive. The two forms are considered part of the normal variation of this variety; var. latifolia was given as a synonym of var. chilensis by A.C. Smith (1943). Bean (1976) likely refers to the two varieties when stating that ‘D. winteri is most tree-like and most prominent in the forest vegetation in the far south of the continent [i.e. var. winteri]; in the northern part of its range [i.e. var. chilensis], in spite of the warmer climate, it makes a small tree, preferring damp soils, where it forms colonies known as canelares.’

In cultivation, some plants are of a shrubby habit, with numerous stems at the base. Bean (1976) mentions a plant at Kilmacurragh in Ireland, a vast bush about 15 m high in 1966, with one of many stems reaching 78 cm in diameter. This survived until 2011, when it was discovered to be infected by Phytophthora kernoviae (S. O’Brien pers. comm. 2025), unfortunately the first record in Ireland of this pathogen (see below). The Tree Register (2025) records several specimens with multiple stems, e.g. at Fota Arboretum in Co. Cork, Ireland. According to Bean, this form was once commonest in gardens. More slender and upright forms are also in cultivation, with definite leaders, thus resembling the trees usually seen in the Andes. The Britain and Ireland Champion for Height is at Castlewellan National Arboretum in Co. Down, Ireland, and reached 20 m × 63 cm in 2015.

In North America, there are plants in several botanical gardens in the Pacific Northwest. At the University of California Botanical Garden at Berkeley, there are four plants of wild origin from seed collected by R. Ornduff in Quillota Province, Chile, in 1983. They are listed as D. winteri but are likely to be var. chilensis (Quillota is north of the distribution area for var. winteri) (University of California Botanical Gardens at Berkeley 2025). Plants of possibly the same source are also at San Francisco Botanical Garden, accessioned in 1984 (San Francisco Botanical Garden 2025). The University of Washington Botanic Gardens lists both D. winteri and D. winteri var. chilensis in their database, but it is not clear whether they hold both varieties (University of Washington Botanic Gardens 2025). A plant is also recorded at Hoyt Arboretum in Portland, Oregon, which interestingly gives a hardiness rating for it of USDA Zone 7a (Hoyt Arboretum 2008). At the University of British Columbia Botanical Garden in Vancouver, Canada, a recently moved plant suffered damage in the harsh winter of 2021–22 (low of –12 °C), dying back entirely to the ground, but has since resprouted and reached about 1 m with multiple stems, surviving a –15 °C cold snap in 2024. In its previous, more sheltered location, it had reached about 1.4 m × 6 cm in diameter at 15 cm in about five years (D. Justice pers. comm. 2025).

In Australia, it is grown in several gardens in Victoria; at Otway Ridge Arboretum, a plant grown from seed collected in Chile in 1985 has reached about 10 m (A. Watt. pers. comm. 2025).

It is cultivated in private gardens in Santiago de Chile, where a south-facing orientation is recommended, due to the preference for moisture in the air as well as in the soil (Rojas 2016). It can serve as a pioneer species for the recovery of degraded ecosystems in the fjords of Chile and the acid bogs known locally as ñadi, displaying vigorous, monopodial growth in high-density plantings (C. Elgueta pers. comm. 2025). The species has also been used successfully as a street tree in the city of Linares, south of Santiago (Ibáñez 2022).

Hardiness seems to be on the right side of borderline for our temperate zone. The Tree Register (2025) records plants in southern England, and also in Scotland, Channel Islands, and especially in Ireland. In inland areas of Great Britain and Ireland, it will benefit from some shelter and may suffer some damage in hard frosts. It also appreciates moisture, so it will not do well where the soil is dry or shallow; it prefers warm, well-drained sandy or loamy soil, and chalk is not an issue. It can grow in semi-shade and tolerates strong winds but not maritime exposure. Best propagated by cuttings of shoots with half-ripened wood rooted under glass; layering is also an option. Growing from seed is likewise a viable alternative, though there will be some seedling variation. (Bean 1976; Hogan 2008; Muñoz et al. 2021).

Drimys winteri is unfortunately a host to the pathogen Phytophthora kernoviae. First found in the UK in 2003, P. kernoviae was detected on D. winteri in 2009 (The Food and Environment Research Agency 2010; Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs 2024). Two years later, it was found in Ireland on the big specimen at Kilmacurragh mentioned above, and in 2012 it was found for the first time in Chile on D. winteri (Sanfuentes et al. 2016). Phytophthora has also been responsible for the loss of Drimys in other Irish gardens. The immediate response at Kilmacurragh was to fell and burn the infected specimen, plus all other Drimys on site, as an urgent biosecurity necessity, but the species does not seem unduly susceptible, and replacement Drimys are now flourishing at Kilmacurragh. It is worth recording that the contractors engaged to fell the big specimen were severely affected by the tree’s sap, which was highly irritant to the skin (S. O’Brien pers. comm. 2025).


var. winteri

Synonyms
Drimys winteri var. punctata (Lam.) DC.
Drimys punctata Lam

Characterized by its stout twigs, crowded and coriaceous leaves, usually obovate with thick petioles, and its usually single flowers with comparatively few petals (5 to 7). (Smith 1943)

Distribution

  • Argentina – Southwest, Tierra del Fuego
  • Chile – South of parallel 42°S

This is the typical variety, found mainly south of 42°S, approximately between Chiloé Island and Cape Horn. In Argentina, the 42nd parallel divides the provinces of Río Negro and Chubut. It is what Captain John Winter would have brought back from the Straits of Magellan and become known as Winter’s bark. It is probably not in cultivation in UK and Europe, but what seems to be this variety is grown at Otway Ridge Arboretum in Vicitoria, Australia. In the wild, it can reach 20 m according to Fundación R.A. Philippi (2025) – though in exposed areas in the southern area of its range, e.g. Tierra del Fuego, it grows as small trees to about 7–10 m (A. Watt pers. comm. 2025).