American hornbeam cultivars for fall colour

2 years ago

I have an area in a yard which sometimes gets a little wet. I was considering American Hornbeam as it’s tolerant of slightly wet soil as against European hornbeam. However- the issue is American Hornbeam is not known for best and dependable fall colour. But then- a local nursery offers two cultivars which are supposed to offer good fall colour: Carpinus Fire King and Rising Fire. Any experience with either? Rising fire is supposed to be columnar. Other than that- has anyone personally experienced the trees and whether they really do deliver consistent great fall colour as advertised ? (I am in central New Jersey - which is now Zone 7)
Also- if these are planted in partial shade- can one still expect good fall colour

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sah_upstate4 (zone 5b - NY)

2 years ago

last modified: 2 years ago

No experience with 'Fire King', but I've had C. caroliniana 'J.N. Upright'/"FireSpire" (which comes from the same breeding program as Fire King) in the ground for about 4 years now: the growth rate has been very slow, but the fall color has been reliably excellent. I also added Carpinus 'FireBelle' last spring, and although I don't give much credence to anything a tree does in its first year after planting, it also had really nice color in the fall.

Here's "FireBelle" from last October (I couldn't find any of my photos of "FireSpire"):

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Comments (6)

AJ Princeton NJ z6b
Original Author
2 years ago
Wow ! That’s fantastic ! It almost seems like if it was Nyssa
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AJ Princeton NJ z6b
Original Author
2 years ago
Did you get this from a local nursery? How big is it? Also- have you planted this in full sun to get this colour?
Jameszone7a Philadelphia
2 years ago
Didn’t fit my need but I had a screenshot from a Houzz thread of the above mentioned firespire and it looked great ! I debated adding one but ended up with a bunch of nyssas instead.
sah_upstate4 (zone 5b - NY)
2 years ago
AJ,

I got both via mail order from Sooner Plant Farm. Our local native plant nursery has lots of the wild type C. caroliniana but the cultivars are very hard to find anywhere near here.

My ”FireSpire” gets sun from about 10am-3pm (which would probably qualify as ”part sun”) and still developes the fall color reliably. ”Firebelle” is planted in a similar situation, but again, I’m reserving judgment on that one until it’s more established.

FWIW: C. caroliniana is a fairly common understory tree in healthy woodlands near me, and I’ve see several specimens in almost full shade develop ”decent” fall color, but the wild populations are pretty variable in that aspect.
UpperBayGardener (zone 7)
2 years ago
" the growth rate has been very slow, but the fall color has been reliably excellent. "

To be devil's advocate for a moment (or something like that) very slow rate of growth is actually what some people would be looking for in a Carpinus.