A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2007 Southern plant from seed "cone"

Its been a while since I posted. I was wondering if any of our Southern members could identify this by description. Quite a few years ago on a visit down South I picked up several of what looked like evergreen cones, but you could see seeds in them. I thought they were interesting and just used them as display items at Christmastime, like you'd use pinecones. They finally started falling apart, so I thought I'd plant one in a flower pot(the whole cone) and was surprised to see it growing. Its not very healthy--the leaf tips are brown, so I'm probably not supplying enough humidity. Also, the stem looks like the lower part of a poinsettia that has dropped its lower leaves. Its only about 6 inches tall so far, the leaves are toothed and of an elongated heart shape and feel a but fuzzy. Any ideas so I can give it proper care?

what part of the south are you calling south?

Which state?

Sounds like a maginolia tree cone, but the leaves sound wrong, could be a different kind of maginolia. If you knew which state you could do a search for trees of that state.

It was so long ago I forget which state. It might have been in Virginia, but we covered a lot of states that trip, including North Carolina, Tennessee and Kentucky. Might even be Maryland. It does look like the sketches I've seen of Magnolia pods; I'll double check the leaves. I do know for a fact that they're slightly fuzzy--that I'm not wrong on.

I don't remember seed pods and the seeds are contained in each fruit of the fruit cluster. But I used to get the two confused and the fuzzy leaves on the underside was my clue. (I was just a kid!)

Could it be a loquat or japanese plum tree? The leaves look a lot like a magnolia leaf, but they aren't shiny. It's been a long time since I've seen one, but the leaf is heavily veined and crinkly and the underside is fuzzy. It has small fragrant flowers in the fall and fruit in the spring. As a kid I didn't like the fruit--not sweet enough, but I enjoyed them as I matured.

Loquat Tree Pictures and Description

This may not be it but the description does describe the underside of the leaf as brown and "hairy."

Ann

Wow! Interesting tree. I like it. Not mine, though. Actually, the pods do very much resemble magnolia ones, but I've seen photos where magnolia seeds are red. Mine has always been light brown with darker brown seeds. I checked the leaves more closely this morning. They're actually more elliptical than I thought, and what I thought were teeth is actually wavy edges. The little hairs are on top. It probably is some member of the Magnolia family. I used to have a Magnolia, but mine never had this kind of seed pod--actually, I don't remember one at all, so that's why I never associated it with that family.

A Google on "seed pods" came up with a lot of interesting hits. You might check them, but here are a few that seemed promising:

U K Seed Site No Magnolias but many other seed pods shown.

Missouri Botanical Gardener Plantfinder Many magnolias but the few I looked at with seed pods seemed to be red.

Oyama Magnolia\' Autumn Seed Pods

Hopefully you'll see a similar seed on one of them.

Ann

What wonderful sites! I still haven't identified it, but I'm moving that UK seed site to my Favorites list. I had a couple of close ones, but so far nothing 100%, either much smaller or wrong kind of leaves. If I do find out, however, I'll let you know. Thanks for introducing me to these sites and for all your help.