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Re: Are these Magnolia virginiana var australis???

Message from RonDEZone7a

From my understanding, you are correct that M. virginiana australis is generally a tall single-stemmed tree and the northern M. virginiana tends to be deciduous and multi-stemmed.

But from my reading, both forms can occur in the wild in the same areas (especially coastal North Carolina and the mid-South) and there are also intermediate forms, that keep some foliage but not all. Complicating this, there are also small dwarf evergreen forms - like the Magnolia virginiana of the Florida Everglades and the Dobb's little-leaf forms.

So, whatever they sell at nurseries these days could be almost anything - especially if they are not named cultivars. I am starting to see more evergreen forms show up around here, in public plantings, and I doubt that the people planting them even know or care what they got.


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