$20 Viminallis

[teejay]

Recently at a landscape gardening nursery I picked up this Callistemon Viminallis (that's all it said) for $20 in the bargain bin. After a chop I'm looking forward to seeing some backbudding, new branches etc...

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[Jarrod]

Looks like a good start. Hope you get the back budding you are chasing. Especially on the current leader. It's a bit straight!

[teejay]

Haha... Yeah it's actually about half that height now. I chopped it back to the small shoot a part of the way up. But ultimately, depending on back budding, that second branch may become the leader and I might direct it out to the left slightly from there and give it some more movement. I mainly want buds on those two branches so I'll be keeping the top fairly well trimmed while I let the rest go a bit wild for year or two. I might even make that leader decision by summer.

It's already budding at the base so there's also some good sacrifice options in the future also.

[MelaQuin]

Not the front.... it looks as tho it is going away from the viewer at this angle. But you will get so much new growth that major changes of ideas in a few months are on the cards. The trunk is nice and a good find.

[Pup]

G, day Teejay, C, viminalis is the species, commonly called the weeping bottle brush.

Also the one used most for hybridising the Callistemon cultivars.

It appears there are as many if not more cultivars than species now.

Viminalis is a very vigorous grower, that is why it used I assume.
Pup

[teejay]

G'Day Pup.

I have a few Viminalis 'Captain Cooks' also which look a great deal different to this one. The foliage on those appears a darker green and the trunk is darker while this one has a rough, light coloured trunk and lighter foliage. I see this one everywhere around where I live, I just wasn't sure if it was or wasn't some sort of cultivar also.

I'm guessing these bud back just as easily as the Captain Cooks?

[teejay]

Not the front.... it looks as tho it is going away from the viewer at this angle.

Today at least, the front has to be somewhere in that vicinity. There's a few large scars around the other side...

[Pup]

G'Day Pup.

I have a few Viminalis 'Captain Cooks' also which look a great deal different to this one. The foliage on those appears a darker green and the trunk is darker while this one has a rough, light coloured trunk and lighter foliage. I see this one everywhere around where I live, I just wasn't sure if it was or wasn't some sort of cultivar also.

I'm guessing these bud back just as easily as the Captain Cooks?

Teejay, the Captain Cook is the most famous of the viminalis cultivars. C, viminalis Captain Cook is a dwarf cultivar or a (witches broom ) of viminalis.
Since then there have been a lot of plants sold as Captain Cook which are not.
Like all good things there are those that cash in on the wagon.
Captain Cook does not weep as much I have found. All Callistemons that I have grown bud back well, albeit not always where you want them.

Pup