Real weeping willow
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True weeping willow ( Salix babylonica ) |
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| Salix babylonica | ||||||||||||
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The real weeping willow ( Salix babylonica ) is a species of willow ( Salix ) in the willow family (Salicaceae). It is also referred to as Chinese because of its origin or as Babylonian weeping willow because of its botanical name .
features
The real weeping willow is a tree with widely spreading branches that reaches heights of 10 to 20 meters. The branches are long, rod-shaped, thin, light gray, glabrous and overhanging.
The leaves are short-stalked, lanceolate, up to 17 inches long and 2.5 inches wide, long, pointed and just as converging at the base. The leaf margin is serrated cartilaginous. The top is dark green, the bottom gray-green, both sides are bare. The petiole is 5 millimeters long. Stipules are rarely present.
The real weeping willow is, like all willows, dioeciously separated sexes ( diocesan ), however, as an exception, there are occasionally female flowers that occur in the male catkins. The kittens are 4 to 5 inches long, cylindrical and pendulous. Male catkins have flowers with two bare stamens . Female kittens have flowers that contain bald ovaries and thick stigmas . The bract is monochrome and light, its outside is loosely hairy, the tip is not bearded. Of the two male nectar glands , the rear is elongated and club-shaped, the front small. The female nectar gland is the posterior nectarium.
The flowering period lasts from April to May.
The number of chromosomes is 2n = 38, 76, less often 63 or 72.
Occurrence
The real weeping willow comes from East Asia. Here it originally occurs from China and Japan to East Turkestan. Today it is used as an ornamental tree all over the world. It grows on moist and loose soils by bodies of water.
hybrid
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The real weeping willow ( Salix babylonica ) is hybridizing with the white willow ( Salix alba ) as well as with the broken willow ( Salix fragilis ). The scientific name for the hybrid Salíx fragilis × Salix babylonica is Salix × pendulina Wenderoth , for the hybrid Salix alba × Salix babylonica it is Salix × sepulcralis Simonk. Both hybrids are also grown in mourning (Meikle 1984; Jäger 2000).
Salix × sepulcralis Simonk. (Synonym: Salix × salamonii (Carrière) Carrière ) is the most widespread weeping willow in Central Europe, since the introduced real weeping willow is frost-sensitive and winters easily, with hermaphrodite flowers often also appearing. Compared to the hybrids with the broken willow, the hybrid with the white willow is preferred in gardening and landscaping because it - inherited from the white willow - has a dense, silvery shimmering hair on the leaves on the underside.
The variety 'chrysocoma' is among the different varieties of Salix × sepulcralis the most common, it is a hybrid of the white willow variety yolk willow ( Salix alba 'Vitellina' and Salix alba var. Vitellina ) with the Real weeping willow ( Salix babylonica ).
Furthermore, a weeping form of the white willow Salix alba 'Tristis' is in trade and widely planted (Jäger 2000). Salix alba 'Tristis' is often understood as a synonym of Salix × sepulcralis 'Chrysocoma' and is indistinguishable from it, but the weeping form of the white willow called Salix alba var. Tristis (serings) K. Koch may represent one It is an independent form that is not a Salix babylonica hybrid; in contrast to Salix × sepulcralis, there are no hermaphroditic flowers. Salix alba 'Tristis' grows up to 20 meters high, while Salix × sepulcralis 'Chrysocoma' only grows to around 12 meters and is not quite as hardy. Both have golden yellow shoots and are otherwise difficult to distinguish.
The Wisconsin weeping willow ( Salix × blanda Andersson ) (synonym Salix × elegantissima K. Koch ) or Thurlow weeping willow is known from North America, it may be a hybrid with the laurel willow ( Salix pentandra L. ), but also the broken willow ( Salix fragilis L. ) comes into consideration as a parent species, then Salix × blanda would become a synonym of Salix × pendulina Wender. be.
In general, it must be assumed that the exact identity and origin of the weeping willow varieties found in stores cannot be sufficiently clarified.
literature
- Urs Jäger: Determination of willows (Salix L.) and their hybrids in Saxony-Anhalt , in: Communications on floristic mapping in Saxony-Anhalt . Volume 5, pages 139-159, 2000.
- RD Meikle: Willows and Poplars of Great Britain and Ireland . BSBI Handbooks 4. London 1984, ISBN 0-901158-07-0 .
- Gunter Steinbach (Ed.): Shrub trees (Steinbach's natural guide). Mosaik Verlag GmbH, Munich 1996, ISBN 3-576-10560-3 .
Individual evidence
- ^ Salix babylonica at Tropicos.org. In: IPCN Chromosome Reports . Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis
