Friday Fabulous Flower - Golden Chain Tree

If you are looking for a small flowering tree to brighten up some spot in your garden, then you must consider a golden chain tree (Laburnum x watereri). For a flowering tree their display is fairly long lived (think 1.75 l vs. 0.75 l bottle of wine), and the tree is fairly tolerant, but maybe not even completely hardy in zone 5 in our experience. They do flower at an early age and can be trained to an arbor if you have the patience, in which case the long pendant inflorescences hang down rather like wisteria. Ours sits way back at the intersection between a perennial bed and a Japanese garden, but the display of even our small tree (recovering from winter die back a year ago) was easily seen from our house 200 feet away.

Seeking the perfect shrub

A long narrow garden ends in a round area about 4 meters in diameter next to our patio, and the lovely cascading Japanese maple that grew there died last summer, a victim of verticillium wilt. The tree was quite a focal point, and since Japanese maples are rather susceptible to wilt, replanting another right away isn't a good idea. The area gets morning sun, afternoon shade, and the idea is to not plant something of large stature which would block the view from the house to the yard and gardens beyond. Of course this area gets hot summers and cold winters, a lot of wind, so a certain degree of toughness is required as well as a minimum of zone 5 winter hardiness. So what to plant that will be aesthetically pleasing as a garden focal point and yet fit all the remaining parameters, and mind you, the Phactor gets quite bored with the ordinary, which is why there are over 150 different types of woody plants growing in our estate. So far nothing has suggested itself as a front runner replacement shrub. Your nominations will be accepted.