Does anyone know why Juniperus Chinensis isn't sold anywhere?

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Like the title says, there are a bunch of chinensis cultivars available; kaizuka, spartan, stricta, blaauw, itoigawa, kishu..
There are also a bunch of hybrids like pfizers and media.
I have searched far and wide and plain old regular juniperus chinensis is nowhere to be found. Other than some French bonsai stores, from which I bought one in the past.

I can't really find out why they aren't available anywhere outside of the bonsai world.

This wasn't the case in the 1970's and before, they were availabe all around back then, I've been told. I wonder why all the nurseries went with sabina and hybrids, or chinensis cultivars. Other than money and aesthetics, does anyone know more?

For clarity's sake: I'm not looking for regular chinensis, I already have one. I just like to learn more about the 'why' of its disappearance in the nursery trade after the 1970's.
The old nursery guys I asked, just couldn't get them at a certain point in time but they don't know why either.

 

[leatherback]

Maybe they grow too slow to be interesting for landscaping?
Dunno, just scratching this old nub on top of my neck.

 

[TomB]

I guess people just want cultivars, or the industry thinks that.
Similarly, here in the UK I never ever see plain Mugo or Sylvestris pines in garden centre nurseries, only named cultivars. Though I guess dwarf varieties of those trees are more useful in regular gardens.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Similarly, here in the UK I never ever see plain Mugo or Sylvestris pines in garden centre nurseries, only named cultivars. Though I guess dwarf varieties of those trees are more useful in regular gardens.

I can find pumillo and mughus in nurseries around here, those are the two 'wildtype' mugo's that can be found in nature: mughus in the lower alps growing with an upright stature, and pumillo in the higher mountains with a more creeping/spreading habit. Mughus is rare around here, but it is available. As for sylvestris, here too it's mostly cultivars, but very few to be honest.

It's an industry thing, I'm sure. But chinensis has all the qualities a sabina has, except for the lemon-green spring growth, but chinensis can go gold/purple whereas most sabina doesn't always do that. I'm wondering why the industry made a decision to just stop with chinensis entirely.

I've tried to find information in every language I can read, but nothing on the web points in any direction.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

I think I found a clue. In the late 1970's and early 1980's observations started occurring about a Cypress Leafminer as an invasive species from the Alps.

Argyresthia trifasciata - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Not long after, descriptions like these were made in forrestry magazines and plant/botanical literature:

This Alpine species was probably introduced in some other European countries such as France, Great Britain and Spain in the second half of the 20th century. It was also found in the same period in our country, this became clear when specimens were caught at Oegstgeest (province of Zuid-Holland) in 1982. Ten years later the species was known already from 60 localities across the provinces other than Flevoland, Groningen and Friesland. Another ten years later it was also known from the remaining provinces including the Wadden isles of Texel and Terschelling. Nowadays, it is a common member of the Dutch fauna.

| Nederlands Soortenregister

www.nederlandsesoorten.nl

Since these bugs are native to the Alps, and Sabina is too, there might be a connection. But then again, I found this exact leaf miner this year in some twigs of my pfizers, which are sabina hybrids. So I don't think that pest resistance plays a role in this. It could be that sabina is more resistant than chinensis, and that chinensis was removed from the market to tackle the spread of this miner.. Since hedgerows made out of cupressaceae are pretty popular around here, it could've been a huge economic issue if these animals were to spread in large numbers. A tree with little to zero resistance to this miner would be the perfect breeding ground.
But that's just a hunch.

 

[leatherback]

Since these bugs are native to the Alps, and Sabina is too, there might be a connection. But then again, I found this exact leaf miner this year in some twigs of my pfizers, which are sabina hybrids. So I don't think that pest resistance plays a role in this. It could be that sabina is more resistant than chinensis, and that chinensis was removed from the market to tackle the spread of this miner.. Since hedgerows made out of cupressaceae are pretty popular around here, it could've been a huge economic issue if these animals were to spread in large numbers. A tree with little to zero resistance to this miner would be the perfect breeding ground.

I have had the miners in my pfitzers, but not in ittoigawa or regular chinensis...

 

[Michael P]

The reasons are twin evils of the modern world: fashion and marketing.

 

[Shibui]

Down here we have more people with smaller gardens who want low maintenance so the nursery industry is moving more and more to smaller growing forms and neat mounding plants that do not grow too big and need less pruning to maintain a good shape. Some forms of J. chinensis were larger, open growing plants so my guess is the suppliers have moved to cvs that are known to grow smaller and neater.
Could also just be fashion. I am amazed how quickly trends come and go even in the garden. This year it is IN and next year the same plant is so YESTERDAY.

 

[leatherback]

next year

you mean you change the plants in your garden only once per year!?

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

If you can get your hands on 'Itoigawa' and 'Kishu' for bonsai, why bother with "plain old" run of the mill J. chinensis? All those cultivars you listed are considered J. chinensis. Line up any 2 or 3 plants of various chinensis cultivars. Let them grow and develop seed. Plant the seed and you will have seedlings of "plain old chinensis".

If you are a nursery and set out a batch of say 100 "plain old chinensis", all the same age in the same size containers for sale, "plain old chinensis" will have a fair amount of variation as to color, density of foliage, and growth habit. From low and spreading to fairly upright. As foundation plantings, landscape planting and hedgerow plantings, having a batch of plants with various different growth patterns is not what the landscape professional wants for their plantings. They want to be able to predict future growth of the plant. Then consider the production cost of these "unselected" seedlings will be roughly equal to the production cost of select, named cultivars of Juniper chinensis.

Propagation of "plain old chinensis" is just as expensive as propagation of cuttings of select named cultivars. Why not propagate named cultivars, that way the result will be a uniform batch of junipers, more consistent in appearance for the same overhead cost of raising the "plain old variable chinensis".

Makes sense to me that landscape nurseries would propagate named cultivars over unnamed, less uniform batches of seedlings, the named cultivars produce a much more uniform product.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Good points Leo! Predictability and aesthetics are important factors I have overlooked.

 

[Michael P]

--Begin rant--

Leo is right--the predictability of cultivars is an advantage. As a landscape architect, I was being a little flippant in my earlier post. But only a little, LOL. The nursery industry has adopted many deceptive modern marketing practices. One of the worst is selling an old cultivar with a new trademarked name and calling it "New! Improved!" Another is patenting a "new" cultivar that is almost identical to an existing one. Aside from being annoying, confusing, and deliberately dishonest, these practices encourage planting of genetic monocultures that may be more vulnerable to pests and diseases.

--End rant--

 

[HorseloverFat]

This is interesting!

Can you find Chinensis with your eyes and a shovel?

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

You can find them with your eyes @HorseloverFat , you can keep them if you're fast enough with a shovel.

 

[HorseloverFat]

You can find them with your eyes @HorseloverFat , you can keep them if you're fast enough with a shovel.

WELL said!

 

[Bonsai Nut]

I can find J. chinensis everywhere here in the states. In fact, I almost can't find a large nursery without them. What I can't find is J. chinensis 'shimpaku'.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

I am fairly certain 'shimpaku' is not a single registered cultivar. It is the name bonsai people use for a group of cultivars of J. chinensis that have scale foliage. In the USA there are dozens, maybe more than 50 individual cultivars J. chinensis that are named, and being grown by nurseries that would fall into the bonsai category of shimpaku. But shimpaku is a term mainly limited to bonsai people, not the nursery trade. As said above, marketing for the nursery trade has promoted the production of single cultivars, so that you can get truck loads of nearly identical looking shrubs.

Pretty much all the Juniperus chinensis cultivars with scale foliage can be included under the name "shimpaku", so when hitting the nurseries, just look for the scale foliage. There are Juniperus chinensis with needle foliage, these are the "not shimpaku" cultivars of J. chinensis.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

And there re cultivars of J. chinensis that normally have a mix of juvenile (needle) foliage and mature (scale ) foliage, these are not usually included as "shimpaku". The 'San Jose' juniper is one of those that normally has the mixed foliage.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

I can find J. chinensis everywhere here in the states. In fact, I almost can't find a large nursery without them. What I can't find is J. chinensis 'shimpaku'.

We have had one or two nurseries selling wildtype Japanese J. chinensis up until last year.
I think they used another name than shimpaku/shinpaku but I forgot what it was.

I am planning on collecting itoigawa from multiple sources to see if I can find males and females. Not because it's going to be worth my time to hybridize, but I think it's fun to give it a try.

 

[leatherback]

I am planning on collecting itoigawa from multiple sources to see if I can find males and females.

I have 14 or so ittoigawa from multiple surces. GOod chance there are male and female in there.