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Seedlings of several landscape tree species frequently experience cold injury at temperatures that are noninjurious to older specimens of the same species. However, there are few published reports quantifying age-related differences in hardiness. In this study, the stem cold hardiness of a mature, 35-year-old female Sakhalin corktree was compared with that of half-sib seedling progeny of different ages. Ten-, 22-, and 34-month-old seedlings were hardy to -4 °C on 9 Oct., while the 35-year-old parent withstood -12 °C. Ten-month-old seedlings exhibited no further increase in hardiness on 26 Oct., whereas the 34-month-old seedlings and the mature parent were hardy to -16 °C. The 22-month-old seedlings were intermediate in hardiness on this date. The 10- and 22-month-old seedlings had died back to the snowline by late January, but the 34-month-old seedlings and the mature tree were uninjured. The corktree seedlings did not attain midwinter hardiness levels comparable to the adult tree until the winter following their fourth season of growth. The absence of flower buds on cold-tolerant 4- and 5-year-old seedlings suggests that physiological maturation is not a prerequisite for full expression of the cold acclimation capability of this species.
Oakleaf hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia Bartr.) is an understory shrub native to the southeastern United States. Hydrangeas are popular ornamental landscape plants; however, little is known about the diversity in horticulturally important traits for oakleaf hydrangea. Information regarding the variation in important traits could guide future breeding efforts for the species. Seed was collected from 55 populations throughout the range of the species for the purpose of conducting a horticultural characterization of the species compared with select cultivars. Plant architecture was characterized as plant height, number of nodes, internode length, number of branches, and plant width. Plant architecture was measured for container-grown and field-grown plants in two locations (Minnesota and Tennessee). Tolerance to leaf spot (Xanthomonas campestris L.) was characterized for wild-collected seedlings and cultivars by measuring disease severity under exposure to ambient inoculum. Cold hardiness was characterized during two winters with a controlled freezing experiment. During the first winter, seedlings were tested in January; during the second winter, seedlings and cultivars were tested monthly from October through April. Plant architecture varied by environment, with plants growing larger in Tennessee than in Minnesota. The heights of container-grown and field-grown plants were correlated with the collection site latitude (r = −0.66), with populations from the northeastern extent of the range of the species being the most compact, and populations from Florida being the tallest. Leaf spot severity varied significantly among populations and cultivars and was also correlated with latitude for the seedlings (r = 0.70). Two populations in Florida were identified as sources of high tolerance to leaf spot, whereas ‘Flemygea’ and ‘Alice’ were identified as having moderate tolerance to leaf spot. Cold hardiness varied among populations and cultivars and among months of the winter. The overall maximum cold hardiness was observed in February [mean lethal temperature (LT50) = −33.7 °C], and several populations maintained an extreme level of cold hardiness into late winter. Midwinter cold hardiness also varied by latitude (r = −0.65), with northern populations showing higher levels of cold hardiness. These results indicate that certain wild oakleaf hydrangea populations will be useful for introgressing novel variation into breeding programs.