Just inside the new gate by The Patio is a small, multi-stemmed, evergreen tree, Neocinnamomum delavayi (Lecomte) H. Liou, with mostly pendant shoots. Its leaf should catch your eye, because arising at the leaf base are three prominent veins, a straight midvein and two lateral veins arcing toward the leaf tip. The shoot is also easy to recognize; it is markedly plagiotrophic--that is, flattened to place all leaves on a single plane and facing the same direction. The upper leaf surface tends to be green and dull to somewhat shiny, whereas the lower surface is bluish-gray due to the presence of loose wax (epicuticular wax). By gently rubbing the lower surface, you can remove the epicuticular wax to reveal bright green beneath. Each leaf is petiolate and diverges at a forty-five-degree angle from the stem. Crush that same leaf and you will smell the aroma of camphor-like oils. The bark is a warm, dull reddish-brown evenly covered with darker, raised lenticels.
Neocinnamomum (laurel family, Lauraceae) is a small genus from China and Southeast Asia, so closely related to Cinnamomum that some taxonomists treat it as belonging to the same genus as camphor, cinnamon, and cassia. These types of woody plants live in the laurel forests of the mountains. Members of this lineage contain essential oils that are produced in special glands located primarily in the bark, but also in the leaves and others parts of the plant.
Our plant has been in the garden for at least forty years, and formerly had a central trunk that had to be removed.
ARTHUR C. GIBSON (Garden Director)