An Asian Sour Gum or Tupelo related to our own eastern Nyssa sylvatica. This deciduous tree does flower but not that you would notice although it does produce small bluish fruits in Fall. Fast-growing with largish leaves often carrying bronzy-purple tones when young.

This is a beloved shrub to small tree species notable for flowering young with nodding white flowers which are best viewed when you can look up into them such as ours on a raised bed. Original introductions likely from Japan have red stamens but this collection of ours differs with yellow stamens.

Myrtle Beech.  This evergreen Tasmanian tree is infrequently seen in cultivation in North America.  Our friend Steve Hootman's seed collection of this species will help put right any wrong in that arena.  Small leaves adorn the branches - great for bonsai.  Gets to be a large tree especially in warm temperate rain forest settings

Our collection of what we presume to be the species psilophyllus although the immature seed capsules match corymbosus.  Time will tell and either way, a fine deciduous shade tree with panicles of white flowers in May and June. Flora of China does not list either species as growing at the collection location which is cool.

This is pretty much our default tree whenever anyone asks about a good small tree. This has zero bad habits that we know about it and is a rapid grower with small evergreen leaves and minute yellow flowers that smell heavenly of marzipan or something similarly decadent.

Snowbell Tree.  Very beautiful Styrax from southern China and a nice infusion of new genetics to go along with the forms already in cultivation.  Vigorous grower of pleasing habit and not overly large at 20'-25' with profuse white flowers of good size for this species.  Small nut-like fruit follow the flowers.  A favorite genus of ours.

Extraordinary yellow-flowered evergreen species from northern Vietnam on this collection. The trees in the wild were all small second-growth trees with mature examples nowhere in evidence. That night we slept in a nearby farmer's house with our sleeping bags on wide flooring planks of magnolia wood - mystery solved where the big trees went. Best in a sheltered spot from freezing winds.

One of the hardiest of the Leptospermums which, in time and left alone, will achieve the appearance of a ruggedly handsome small tree. We say this in case you have control issues and mistake shearing for pruning in which case this will be a nice dense ball.  Or square.  Or blob.  Evergreen, nice white flowers, deer-proof, drought tolerant. Thanks to Leptophiliac Ian Barclay for sharing this..

Likely the first introduction of this gorgeous evergreen broadleaf tree from Vietnam.  The small yellowish flowers are held in terminal panicles, and not a big show.  What is astounding every single day is the exfoliating bark which reveals sensuously smooth mocha skin, soft as the supple inner thigh of your vacation Island lover.

One of our most favored small trees is this princeling of a cornel.  Late winter flowers of yellow filamentous buttons followed by perfectly clean white variegation in the leaves and are further accented when the flowers turn into edible reddish fruits in late summer.

This is the rarest US Magnolia species occurring in just 6 counties in the Florida panhandle. Fantastic species with huge leaves up to 2' or more long and nearly a foot across. On plants young as 3-4 years old, white scented flowers to 10" wide appear in May avoiding frost damage . Dramatic large shrub to small tree.

Typically a white-flowered Tasmanian native evergreen tree, this pink version was found in 1984 by Ken Gillanders. Must have been jaw-dropping as the plant was 65' tall although the tallest in cultivation is perhaps 25'. Serious authorities have it hardy zones 7-10 but we'll say Z 8-10 and best sheltered from freezing/drying wind.

Our selection of an exceptional seedling from a Vietnam collection. Typically green-leafed, this one has lustrous red new growth looking pretty amazing spring through fall and darned good in winter too since it is evergreen. We haven't flowered it yet but expect creamy yellow flowers in summer.  Young plants, cutting propagated.

One of the most sophisticated ornamental small trees and a well-grown mature plant is without rival. Broad spreading branches in well-spaced layers superbly display the foliage and lacy white flowers in May which are followed by bird-yummy black fruit. No anthracnose issues which so afflicts our native Cornus nuttallii.  These are young plants on their own roots and not grafted.

Cutting grown from original seed collection in Vietnam's Hoang Lien Son mountains by Floden-Mitchell-Wynn-Jones.  The evergreen trees were 50' with showy red seed "cones" with scented pink to sometimes red flowers.  We have not flowered our plant so on tenterhooks.  This species is best in mild gardens.

Evergreen Dogwood from our collection in Asia. Quite a handsome plant in both the wild and our garden which sports soft yellow flowers in June and July. Later, the round red fruit go from being attractive ornament on the tree to tasty snacks on the trail. Which is how we got ours.

Snowbell. Superb small tree from an area not botanized by westerners. This will have showy panicles of white flowers in late spring - early summer and is notable for having slightly bronzy new growth which adds to the allure. It has done superbly in full exposure here for several years - mute testament to its tolerance of adversity!

Seed-grown from a wild collection in Winston County Alabama of this unrivaled North American tree..  This has the largest simple leaves of any native plant - up to 30" long - and let's add the flowers as well which are 8"-10" wide and rarely to 12".  These fragrant soup bowls are white with rose-purplish bases and followed by showy big cone-like fruits from which red seeds hang by threads.  Seriously.  Rich moist soil sheltered from wind.

A medium sized tree in the wild, this is from the same remote mountain which yielded the first introductions of Schefflera fengii and Rhododendron sinofalconeri some 25 years ago and has not been revisited since. Vigorous tree with copious white flowers we presume followed by nutlets.

Any and all Styrax appeal to us and this was a necessary collection as a result.  A vigorous tree of good size widely distributed in southern China and into adjoining countries to the south.  This will have a lot of small, white bells in spring followed by pale nutlets clasped by a somewhat swollen green calyx.  A very few of these gallon-sized plants.

Small plants from wild-collected seed of this dramatic species native to the Appalachian and Blue Ridge Mountains.  Drama comes in with the leaves - up to 24" long and 10" across and the white 6"-10" flowers.  The flowers are scented but not pleasantly so and not enough to banish from the garden this impressive tree.

From the Yunnan-Vietnam borderlands, this small-leafed evergreen dogwood makes an attractive tree.  Flowers not seen but if anything like the red fruit when ripe, then boom-shaka-laka!  Even if the flowers are not as hoped, what a gift to focus on its many attributes and the modern plague of unrealistic expectation. Gallon pots.

An impressive member of the witch hazel family with showy red flowers in the latter half of summer.  We had our world-view of Rhodoleia shaken like a snow globe when we saw an imposing old growth tree of this species in southern Yunnan with a straight clean trunk going on and on.  Evergreen leaves usually glaucous beneath.