Blithewold and Chamaecyparis pisifera 'Filifera Aurea'

This week and next I'll be posting a few photos from Blithewold in Rhode Island.  Blithewold is a mansion outside of Providence that was finished construction in 1896.  I went there in August while visiting a friend and took scads of photos.

The first I'm sharing is of Chamaecyparis pisifera 'Filifera Aurea.'  I saw this majestic specimen towering next to the mansion no sooner than two days after teaching it to my students.  The words still haunt me: 'Filifera Aurea Nana' is the dwarf cultivar of this plant, and is most common.  'Filifera Aurea' can get very tall - up to 80' - but not around here.  Perhaps in Japan you can find the species getting that tall, but not here.

Yep, nevermind. As you can guess by scaling the workers, this specimen is well on its way to reaching 40' plus.  When I saw it, I think I actually blushed with shame!

In my defense, this is a rarity on the east coast and I suspect the plant was installed shortly after the mansion was built; it only grows a few inches a year.  If we said the plant was 40' high (480") and grew at 6" a year (optimistic), we could age this tree at about 80 years.  I'd say it grows more slowly than 6", too.

That said, Blithewold is located on a peninsula near Bristol Harbor and the water would create milder winters and more humidity, both of which would suit this plant well.

Above is another specimen - in a size you're more likely to encounter - in Bryant Park in New York.  It's clear from the long, threadlike branchlets why this plant is called 'Filifera' and the gold color easily accounts for 'Aurea.' Pisifera literally means "bearing peas" and is referring to the very diminutive cones that the species will bear. Chamaecyparis is derivative of the Greek word chamai which means "on the ground" and kuparissos which is the Greek word for cypress.