On 26/05/2013 10:08, Sacha wrote:
Our mulberry tree is finally showing leaf buds. I'll always be grateful
to Kay for warning me that it was just about the last thing in the
garden to do so! It looks as dead as a stick for a lonnnnng time and
then suddenly bursts into life.


Firast to lose its leaves as well AND breaks its branches easily

--
Janet T.
Amersham

On 27/05/2013 11:08, Pam Moore wrote:
Six or seven years in our case. It's now over twenty years old and has
masses of fruit every year.

David
Lucky you!


huh I grew one from seed and it was enormous, but dropped tiny weeny
purple fruit all over the grass and it ended up with a right mess and
drunk butterflies lolling all over the top of the water butts where the
fruit had squishes down.

Leaves come down very early and are huge roots grow near the top of the
grass surface, bits broke off regularly, hacked it down to about 5 foot
and now get easily a mass of 7 foot strong water shoots (I guess)
every year from all the ends of the stumps

Why do leaves change shape as a plant gets older like mulberry and ivy?

The older mulberry leaves are completely different to those it had when
younger, No they aren't sucker it was from a seed but definitely the
leaves changed shape

--
Janet T.
Amersham

On 2013-05-27 22:33:11 +0100, Janet Tweedy said:

On 26/05/2013 10:08, Sacha wrote:
Our mulberry tree is finally showing leaf buds. I'll always be grateful
to Kay for warning me that it was just about the last thing in the
garden to do so! It looks as dead as a stick for a lonnnnng time and
then suddenly bursts into life.


Firast to lose its leaves as well AND breaks its branches easily

I haven't noticed re the leaves, so I'll keep an eye open. But ours
hasn't been losing any branches. My parents had a truly ancient one
that hung down to the ground and made a sort of camp for us children. I
can't remember any bits coming off that, either, though the trunk had
long ago split and was held together with an iron band. In the end, a
violent storm sweeping up from the sea brought the whole thing down.
--

Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.com
South Devon
www.helpforheroes.org.uk

On Mon, 27 May 2013 17:48:23 +0100, Sacha wrote:

On 2013-05-27 17:03:48 +0100, Jeff Layman said:

On 27/05/2013 12:06, Sacha wrote:

Almost all trees are for the enjoyment of later generations. ;-) I'm
deeply thankful to whoever planted the cedar trees and copper beeches,
oaks and yews here!

I note that sycamore and ash didn't make the list! ;-)

Lol!! We do have them - quite a lot of the former thanks to it following
its own devices! ;-)

Well yes, but a large mature sycamore is really a fine and stately tree.
Requires a lot of room, though!

Couldn't agree more with your statement though, Sacha. I will never live
to see my aceretum mature, but it's nice to think that my children will.
And of course trees give us great pleasure when young, not to mention the
pruning and training.

Unfortunately the previous owners of the farm here were inclined to cut
down everything for firewood, including mature cherries and oaks. When
we bought the place the only mature trees were 3 great Tilia, left
because they're not much good in the stove! We've planted hundreds of
trees since. The owners had some other curious habits too, like caulking
windows with cement. I still run across these once in a while...



--
Gardening in Lower Normandy

Your tree is a complete aberration;-) You've said the fruit is insipid, whereas black mulberry fruit is incredibly intense in flavour, it grows much faster, and my tree certainly doesn't lose bits (nor does the one in the local park) And it's not particularly early to lose its leaves.

Holly leaves are different shapes - the ones higher up tend to be less prickly - easy to see the logic there, as the higher ones are less in danger of animal grazing. Not easy to see the mulberry logic - it's not to do with allowing light through as it's the young leaves which are irregularly shaped. Whereas with courgettes it's the other way around - starts with simple leaves and later produces lobed ones.

Herbaceous plants do the same thing - leaves on the flowering stem are very often different from basal leaves.