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I agree, I like the look of some feral trees. My mother had a huge crepe myrtle in her front yard that never saw a trimmer and it was so pretty I sent a photo of it in to the local papers. Yours is beautiful!
i love the notion of a feral plant or feral bush or feral tree!
i actually kinda know what he means. i lived in the Pacific Northwest for many years, and there were rhododendrons, which i had always thought of us "bushes", until I lived in Oregon and there were rhodie bushes which towered over and were taller than 2-story houses, rhododendrons over 20 feet tall.
maybe that's what he means by a feral bush.
i am curious to hear more on feral plants. it delights me.
Wow, that's a beautiful tree!
The definition of feral means not domesticated or wild, so any plant that has been cultivated and planted can't be feral no matter how you take care of it by definition.
This was the only bush he messed up. Everything else was satisfactory. But this Camellia was not feral, it was beautiful before it was butchered. I also have a red one thank goodness he didn't touch. I will post more photos tomorrow. I just need to know if it should be trimmed into a more round shape or if it will do this on it's own. Anything I can do to try and get it looking like a Camellia again. Thank you.
Generally speaking, if someone insists upon carving shrubs into unnatural shapes (the horror), the top needs to be narrower, not wider than the base. The way it is now, the sun cannot reach the lower branches.
Camellias are rather slow growing, so you need to patiently coax it back to its natural shape....branch by branch. If you don’t know how, check your county extension office or online camellia expert.
Generally speaking, if someone insists upon carving shrubs into unnatural shapes (the horror), the top needs to be narrower, not wider than the base. The way it is now, the sun cannot reach the lower branches.
Camellias are rather slow growing, so you need to patiently coax it back to its natural shape....branch by branch. If you don’t know how, check your county extension office or online camellia expert.
I call trees and shrubs that have been formed into unnatural shapes by people, tortured plants.
The definition of feral means not domesticated or wild, so any plant that has been cultivated and planted can't be feral no matter how you take care of it by definition.
That isn't entirely correct.
The definition of feral is any non-native domesticated animal, fish or plant, as well as non-native non-domesticated insects or fish that have been introduced to an alien environment and then been neglected and allowed to get loose to fend for itself and to breed and become invasive in its non-native environment. Examples in North America include feral pigs/boars, mustangs and donkeys, household pets, a huge variety of plants (Himalayan blackberries as one example), insects and fish from other continents.
Several types of domesticated non-native plants are capable of changing their characteristics and going feral in their growth patterns when they have been neglected and unmanaged/uncontrolled and allowed to fend for themselves in a non-native environment. Non-native camellias is an example. There are only two true wild species of camellias that are native and grow naturally in North America, the other up to 300 other species of camellias introduced to North America are all non-native domesticated species that originate from Asia.
I just ran across a photo of this Camellia that was taken a year ago at the end of a heavy bloom season. You are right, it has done a good job of taking care of itself all these years. Many years ago a couple up the road had their house burn down and they had lovely plants in their yard.
A local tree man got permission to transplant and sell most of their plants and trees. We got 2, my red one and this white one. No telling how old they are now.
Thanks OP, that last picture helps too. Wow ..... Yard Guy took off fully the upper half of the tree! I see though what he was starting out trying to do before he realized how badly overgrown the interior of the tree had become with feral suckers and he gave up.
So if you want to try fixing and reshaping it yourself I'm explaining here what is the simplest thing I would do for starters if I was working on the plant. I've copied the picture of the condition it's in now and you'll see where I've drawn lines in red on the copy to show where I would make cuts. Don't be alarmed that too much is cut off or that it will be too small after the cuts are made because remember that it's going to grow back and just about each single place that has a cut is going to grow a minimum of 2 new shoots, but probably more like 3 or 4 new shoots below each cut. Later next year or the year after you will probably have to remove some of the new shoots too, otherwise it could end up getting too bushy, dense and top heavy with no light or air circulation getting into the interior
I know you said you want it in a rounded or dome shape but I'm reshaping it into a straight sided square cube to start with so by the time it's got its second flush of new growth on it it will be in a rounded shape that is a bit taller at the top than wide across. It won't look like a round ball
Look at the picture below and note the two perfectly vertical lines that go from the ground to the top of the plant, and note the X'es I've made on the outsides of the vertical lines. Everything that is where the X'es are on the outside of the vertical line on each side is going to get cut off straight along the vertical line from top to bottom. Once the first two sides are cut off the same thing will get done on the other two sides. Some of the branches beneath the tree that are hanging too close to the ground will get trimmed off too, about 10 - 12 inches above the ground to provide more clearance from the ground so the trunks will be more visible at ground level and there will be allowance for more essential air circulation. After all 4 vertical sides of the cube have been cut off, the edges and corners can all be cut off lightly to make them look rounded like the way a dice cube has the edges and corners rounded off.
The whole point for starters to do it this way is to get rid of excess foliage at the ends of each branch so it will make it easier to SEE what needs to be done with the interior, to get right into the interior of the plant and remove all the naked stemmed, tangled up feral suckers that are smaller than the size of a pencil and are growing in singles up to groups of 5-6 out of the trunks. They need to be cut off completely flush with the trunks that they're growing out of. Once the tangled sucker stems are gone the interior will be opened up more, larger stronger branches will be easier to identify and they can be left alone. Any brittle or rotting deadwood that is found in the interior at that time should be removed as well.
In a couple of years it will look more like what your red one looks like.
I think maybe both of those camellias are reticulata hybrids - that means they may each be a cross between a reticulata and some other completely different species cultivar of camellia. I could be wrong but they look like it to me. I'm mentioning that because if they are partially reticulata camellias they will continue to get taller and taller maybe up to 30 feet tall as they age because pure bred cultivars of reticulatas can turn into big trees up to 50+ feet tall.
As I mentioned before, if you decide working on it yourself will be too much for you to tackle on your own then you need to get in an arborist who specializes in camellias and knows how to tell their species apart.
i love the notion of a feral plant or feral bush or feral tree!
i actually kinda know what he means. i lived in the Pacific Northwest for many years, and there were rhododendrons, which i had always thought of us "bushes", until I lived in Oregon and there were rhodie bushes which towered over and were taller than 2-story houses, rhododendrons over 20 feet tall.
maybe that's what he means by a feral bush.
i am curious to hear more on feral plants. it delights me.
Beautiful tree, but not for this placement. We knew someone who planted a monkey puzzle tree about 3 feet from the foundation in front of their home. I grew into the house and was a bear to trim. One should always study up before placing anything on ones property that is living. The people we bought our home from planted two curly willow trees in the yard. The soil is clay so no doubt they were attempting to minimize the water but again way too close to the house. They were gone with weeks of us moving in.
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