(OH WHY) Do(n't) flowers reduce????????

We have a small (18 foot) Southern Magnolia (Magnolia grandifolia) out back. It blooms at this time every year.

Here is one of them. The bloom measures 12 inches in diameter! Normally, magnolia flowers are 6-8 inches. It's leaves (just visible in the background) are 9 inches long.

As far as I know Jim, flowers will not reduce. They are the size they are for a reason and that being reproduction. You can breed smaller flowers, different colours and scents but usually at the expense of fertility.

Guess I needed a smiley in my original title.

Why would you want something that lovely to reduce? (Is their another type of tree that could be trained to look like it's larger example that has similar, yet smaller flowers.)

As for the tongue in cheek... yes it is an amazing example of what we here in Illinois call
"something that grows better somewhere else!

(Did you ever notice just how hard it is to say "tongue in cheek" with your tongue stuck in your cheek?)

Jay

Every morning as I take my son to school, I pass by a house with really nice trees all over the yard. No evidence of bonsai, but he /she is triimming up and shorting and styling all the trees in the yard as if they were. Maybe a whole bunch of imperial yard-a-dories soon? Anyway, one of them is a magnolia. It's been kept at about 8-10 feet hight, branching is beautiful, and flowers are just the right size and of course close to the trunk. Beautiful. One day I'll learn how to post pictures. The yard also has japanese maples, crepe myrtles, and dogwoods all under a canopy of great big pines.

Libby

I've got one of these in my front garden too. The blooms are strongly lemon scented and almost make up for the mess that the leathery leaves make when they drop off and take years to rot down.

And for those who hate mosquitoes, I read somewhere that 75 percent of anopheles mosquitoes are born in rain-filled magnolia leaves. They make perfect bowls. I'd guess they'd also make an different kind of bonsai pot.

JimLewis wrote:And for those who hate mosquitoes, I read somewhere that 75 percent of anopheles mosquitoes are born in rain-filled magnolia leaves. They make perfect bowls. I'd guess they'd also make an different kind of bonsai pot.

Ooch! I like magnolias in other people's gardens, preferably several miles away from my white, freckled skin

Went to Turkey on a European school project last week, and on the first evening there, thy could have called me "the shrimp"

But they're such beautiful tress...