Hanging Pensively, Miss Pendula of Niles

Humorous Horticultural Writing from the library

Niles Redwood Develops 'Flop'

Sequoia Giganticus Branches Grow in All Directions on Freakish Tree

"An occasional diversion of species into the "cuckoo class" seems a privilege given by Nature to other than human beings.

"At the gardens of the California Nursery Company in Niles a specimen of the Sequoia Gigantea, California's favorite wonder tree, has gone so completely "haywire" that it is given an extra nursery-Latin handle to describe it. This acquired adjective is Pendula, meaning to hang pensively.

"Miss Pendula of Niles when first stuck in the ground as a mere slip of a tree twenty years ago was destined by the gardeners to become an ordinary giant so that in the thousand years or so the nursery would have a good start on another grove of California big trees.

"But Pendula had other notions. Not being able to be a flapper she merely flopped. So that today, while her trunk is twenty feet high her limbs and foliage droop the limit. Some grow directly downward, crowding tight against the trunk. The needles and foliage are identical with the big tree type except for this notion of growing upside down.

"Recently just to show more independence, the freak Miss Pendula has sent out a limb toward the east which is perpendicular.

date unknown currently

Horticultural note 2014

Cultivars for the Sequoiadendron gigantea are not unusual. Monumental Trees lists quite a few: pygmy, varigated, blue, and weeping.  According to them about 'pendulum', "This French clone was reportedly selected by a nurseryman in Nantes in 1863."

The 1907 catalog has an entry for 'Sequoia Gigantea pendula'.

Montrovia lists a "Weeping Giant Sequoia". I think that Oregon Botanic Garden in Silverton has several along with other weeping forms. Check out their Dr. Seussian trees.