Chamaecyparis pisifera description

Foliage from an ornamental, Seattle (USA) [C.J. Earle, Mar-1999].

Chamaecyparis pisifera (Siebold & Zuccarini) Endlicher

Common Names

SAWARA [Japanese], sawara false-cypress, sawara cypress.

Taxonomic notes

Closely allied to Ch. formosensis; q.v. for differences.

Description

Large evergreen tree with straight trunk and open, narrow, pyramidal crown. Bark reddish-brown, fibrous, shreddy, peeling in long thin strips. Juvenile leaves acicular, 6 mm long, spreading in 4 rows, blue-green, whitish beneath. Mature leaves 3 mm long, scalelike, sharp-pointed, overlapping, opposite in 4 rows, top pair flattened, side pair keeled, shiny green above, whitish-green beneath. the scales 8-10, each scale smoothly rounded and minutely mucronate Female cones resembling a wrinkled green pea in size and shape (hence pisifera): globose, 5-8 mm in diameter, green, turning dark brown, short-stalked, usually composed of 10 scales; scales strongly depressed when dry with a tiny point in the center, the apical pair of scales fused. There are 1-2 broad-winged seeds beneath each scale (Little 1980, Frankis 1999).

Range

Japan: moist soils in the humid temperate zone (Little 1980). USDA hardiness zone 6.

Big Tree

Commonly to 21 m tall and 60 cm dbh (Little 1980).

Oldest

Dendrochronology

Ethnobotany

One of the 'Five sacred Trees of Kiso' in Japan, the others being Ch. obtusa, Thuja standishii, Thujopsis dolabrata and Sciadopitys verticillata (Dallimore et al. 1967).

Widely planted as an ornamental; several numerous cultivars, with the juvenile-foliaged 'Squarrosa' and semi-juvenile 'Plumosa' and similar derivatives abundantly planted (Frankis 1999).

In Japan, an important timber species (Little 1980).

Observations

Remarks

Citations

M.P. Frankis, personal observations communicated 3-Feb-1999.

This page co-edited with M.P. Frankis, Feb-1999.