An amazingly choice and heat-tolerant plant with very large, brilliant yellow, purple-eyed flowers. Although a perennial shrub in warmer climes, this plant is best grown in a large pot or sheltered garden elsewhere. ... Learn More

For the first five years or so this tree grows slowly, it then speeds up to become one of the fastest of conifers both for height and timber volume. This exceptionally handsome, easily grown and disease-resistant tree produces extremely ornamental, violet-purple cones even on small trees. It also has highly aromatic foliage, which, when crushed, has a strong fruity orange smell. Few good fertile seeds collected. ... Learn More

This striking, fast-growing, deciduous shrub bears countless single, fragrant, white (edible!) flowers which are borne in profusion from April to July. It bears downy, greyish, vine-shaped leaves, and does best in a sheltered spot making it an absolute gem in any garden. ... Learn More

Long, hebe-like sprays of fragrant creamy yellow flowers open on branches clad in large leathery leaves. Native to north eastern Queensland in Australia, the Western Province of Papua New Guinea and also the eastern Maluku Islands where it is used mainly for environmental management and timber, when a mean annual height increase of 3 to 4 meters will be obtained if grown near the equator. Its success is down to its extremely vigorous growth rate and its tolerance of highly acidic, low nutrient soils, and also its relative freedom from disease. ... Learn More

A familiar sight, both in gardens and in British hedgerows, this attractive deciduous native tree is clad in deep green maple foliage, which changes to dazzling bright gold and yellows in late summer and autumn. But it is grown as much for its incredible seeds as for its foliage. The first gales of autumn loosen the bunches of amazing propeller-like seeds, which fly in all directions like miniature helicopters. Children (and even some adults!) delight in throwing them up into the air to see how far they can fly! ... Learn More

The leaves of this vigorous, bushy variety are more deeply cut than the normal species, and the dazzling leaves provide a dramatic splash of autumn colour in all shades of yellow, red and crimson. A shallow rooting tree, it adds a strong architectural presence to any garden, requiring little maintenance. ... Learn More

These beautiful ornamental trees include some of the most decorative of foliage trees and shrubs. As well as having a large variety of ornamental barks, autumn turns the leaves, which are often finely divided, all shades of red, scarlet, yellow and bronze. ... Learn More

This attractive, bushy, round-crowned deciduous tree bears creamy white flowers and red fruit, and glossy bright green leaves, with toothed margins, that turn a flaming red or yellow in autumn. The thin pale bark is smooth at first but becomes fissured later. It is native to central and south eastern Europe and south western Asia, from Austria east to south western Russia and the Caucasus, and south to Turkey. ... Learn More

An ideal and unusual addition for the warm or hot exotic garden, this tree, whilst still leafless, has up to 20 dense heads of attractive and unusual reddish-green to orange flowers hanging from the branch ends and dripping nectar. Finally the fruits, elongated and flattened pods appear. ... Learn More

Racemes of greenish yellowish flower grow in dense drooping rat-tail flower heads, almost like catkins. Later, the curved hanging pods, with a bulge opposite each seed, split open into two twisted halves, to reveal the hard, scarlet seeds. The beautiful seeds have long been used as beads for jewellery, and in India they have been used as units of weight for fine gold from historic times because the seeds have almost almost identical weights. The Malay name for the tree, saga, has been traced to the Arabic for 'goldsmith'. This tree is also used for making soap, and a red dye can be obtained ... Learn More

This mid-sized, slender, aromatic, gum-bearing tree has branches clad in leaves with three leaflets and greenish white, sweetly scented flowers, that finally transform into the amazing smooth-shelled "bael fruit" that can be eaten either fresh or dried and tastes of marmalade, although it actually smells of roses! Sacred by Hindus, it is known to produce one of the most commonly used fruits in Ayurvedic treatments as well as other traditional systems of medicine. In the traditional Newari culture of Nepal, this tree is part of a girls fertility ritual known as the Bel baha. Girls are "married" ... Learn More

Startling, large, almost jet-black, smooth-skinned fruit, somewhat resembling the fruits called "Conkers", grow on this rather dwarf tree, which has a somewhat arching habit, and opens large panicles of creamy-yellow coloured flowers in May. These form fruits with noticeably smaller, eye-like white spots than "normal" conkers, hence one of their common names. It occurs mainly in the mountainous regions of the state of Ohio, where in September it produces a spectacular orange and bronze autumn colouration, and is one of the earliest trees to turn. This rare relative of our own UK "Conker", is ... Learn More

This tall elegant tree bears large clusters of small, green, very fragrant flowers in October. The slightly rounded, leathery, dark green leaves form attractive whorls, and the regular branching gives the tree a beautiful shape. An evergreen tropical tree native to the Indian sub-continent, Malaysia and Australasia, its bark, known as Dita Bark, is used in traditional medicine to treat various conditions. The generic name commemorates the botanist, Prof. C. Alston of Edinburgh, 1685-1760 whilst the species name scholaris refers to the fact that the timber of this tree has traditionally been us ... Learn More

Exceptionally tasty fruits called sugar-apples or sweetsops grow on this small, well-branched tree or shrub that tolerates a tropical lowland climate better than its relatives Annona reticulata and Annona cherimola, whose fruits often share the same name. But this one is the most widely cultivated of these species. It is rather similar to soursop (Annona muricata). ... Learn More

A delicious late-ripening apple originally discovered as a seedling growing on the large Penn Inn roundabout at the entrance to our market town of Newton Abbot in South Devon. Even on the poor rocky substrate, this tree produces a large crop of sizeable red-blushed golden apples, and seedlings may produce different fruit. These soft, sweet-fleshed fruits usually keep until December, by which time many other varieties will be well past their eat-by date. ... Learn More