Stewartia
Stewartia pseudocamellia
Particular about its ground — alkaline soil yellows the leaves, and poor drainage rots the roots.
- Type
- Tree · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green · Bronze, red and brown
- Flower color
- White
- Sunlight
- Full sun
- Feeding
- All-purpose balanced
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- July
- Apr–Jul Bud Break
- Jul–Oct Flowering
- Oct–Nov Leaf Fall
- Nov–Dec Winter Dormancy
- Jan–Apr Winter Dormancy
- Plant spacing
- 13 ft 1 in
- In-row spacing
- 13 ft 1 in
- Between rows
- 16 ft 5 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- Woody, shallow and far-reaching
- Working depth
- 12–24 in
- Can reach
- 4 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 26–39 ft across, about 2–3× the width of the plant
Almost all of a tree’s roots are in the top two feet of soil, where the air is, and they run out well past the branch tips. The deep taproot most people picture belongs to the seedling; the tree grows out of it and spends the rest of its life spreading sideways instead.
The habit is Stewartia’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. companion plant
- Hoverfly SyrphidaeHunts Scale insects
Bee-mimicking flies whose legless larvae graze aphid colonies clean while the adults pollinate. A ribbon of shallow, nectar-rich flowers kept in bloom all season recruits wave after wave of them.
- Ladybird (lady beetle) CoccinellidaeHunts Scale insects
The gardener’s favorite ally: adults and their alligator-shaped larvae each eat thousands of aphids, plus scale, mealybugs, and other soft-bodied sap-suckers. Grow flat, open flowers for the adults and never spray a colony that ladybird larvae are already working.
Rhododendrons, Enkianthus, Hostas, Japanese Maples
Trees, like this one.
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com