A tree up to 60 ft high or a shrub; young shoots terete. Leaves of two types that are nearly always found on the same tree, viz., juvenile awl-shaped ones, and small, scale-like, adult ones. The former are 1⁄4 to 1⁄3 in. long, sharply and stiffly pointed, arranged either in threes or oppositely in pairs, with two glaucous lines on the upper surface, green elsewhere. Scale-like leaves usually in pairs, rarely in threes, closely flattened to the branchlet, 1⁄16 in. long, blunt at the apex. The plants are usually unisexual, and the male flowers, very freely borne in early spring, are yellow and pretty. Fruits about 1⁄4 in. in diameter, roundish or rather top-shaped, whitish with bloom when ripe; seeds two or three, occasionally more.
Native of Japan, Mongolia, and China; introduced to Kew in 1804 by W. Kerr. This juniper and J. virginiana are the commonest of tree-like junipers in gardens. It is perfectly hardy. From J. virginiana it differs in its blunt, scale-like leaves, and in the awl-shaped ones being frequently in whorls of threes. As a rule both juvenile and adult leaves occur on the same tree, but occasionally specimens of good age have nothing but juvenile foliage. There are male trees at Kew which bear flowers in the axils of leaves of the awl-shaped, juvenile type. Although J. chinensis is commonly dioecious, plants with flowers of both sexes occasionally occur.
Van Melle’s controversial treatment of J. chinensis is set out in his book Review of Juniperus chinensis et al., published by the New York Botanical Garden in 1947.
A. F. Mitchell has found that few trees survive of those that were mentioned by Elwes and Henry early this century or even of those listed in the returns to the R.H.S. Conifer Conference of 1933. The largest existing specimens are mostly of poor habit and 50 to 60 ft in height and 31⁄2 to 6 ft in girth.
cv. ‘Aurea’. Young’s Golden Juniper. – The whole of the young parts of this plant are golden yellow, very striking in summer. Raised in Young’s nursery at Milford, in Surrey; of rather dense, slender form. The colouring of this variety comes mainly from the adult foliage, which predominates; the juvenile leaves are paler.
cv. ‘Blaauw’ – Resembling ‘Plumosa’ but more erect and with bluish grey foliage. Introduced from Japan by J. Blaauw & Co. of Holland c. 1924 (Den Ouden and Boom, Man. Cult. Conif. (1965), p. 149). ‘Globosa Cinerea’, distributed by Messrs Wallace as “J. virginalis globosa, grey form”, and renamed by Hornibrook, is very similar; it was also imported from Japan, before 1916.
cv. ‘Columnaris’. – Of slender columnar habit. Leaves mostly awl-shaped, deep green. A selection from plants raised from seeds collected by F. N. Meyer in Hupeh, China, in 1905. ‘Columnaris Glauca’ is similar but with glaucous foliage (Den Ouden and Boom, Man. Cult. Conif. (1965), p. 150).
cv. ‘Femina’. – A small tree with rather lax branches. Leaves scale-like, closely appressed. Fruits small, with a vivid blue bloom. The plants grown under this name are probably a clone descended from the plant introduced from China in 1839 by J. R. Reeves as J. flagelliformis and also known as J. reevesiana.
cv. ‘Japonica’. – This has become the established name for what is probably a clone, characterised by very stiff, sharp, glaucous juvenile leaves; such leaves predominate, but on old plants the terminal branchlets bear some adult, scalelike foliage. It grows to a few feet high. This juniper is probably the same as the one described by Carrière in 1855 as J. japonica and said by him to have been introduced to Europe in 1840. But the epithet japonica has been used for other forms of J. chinensis imported from Japan. See ‘Plumosa’.
cv. ‘Kaizuka’. – Main stem and branches slanting; branchlets clustered. Leaves scale-like, vivid green. Female. A very picturesque large shrub (or an irregularly branched tree if the leader is trained). It is also known as J. chinensis var. torulosa Bailey (J. sheppardii var torulosa (Bailey) Van Melle).
cv. ‘Keteleeri’. – Of columnar habit. Leaves scale-like, very pointed. Free-fruiting. It is sometimes placed under J. virginiana. Van Melle refers it to J. sphaerica and notes it is well matched by a specimen collected by Henry in northern Hupeh.
cv. ‘Pfitzerana’. – A medium-sized shrub with arching branches spreading at an angle of about 450 to the horizontal, eventually becoming about 8 ft high and flat-topped. Taller specimens can be obtained by training and pruning when the plant is young. Leaves mainly appressed and sharply pointed (not at all like the true adult leaves of J. chinensis); others acicular and spreading, both kinds occurring together in the same spray. This juniper is now much valued as an architectural plant, but was little known before the second world war. It was put into commerce by Späth’s nurseries in 1899 but he had received the original plant as J. chinensis var. pendula many years earlier.
Van Melle considers that this juniper is J. chinensis × sabina (J. × media Van Melle). He states that similar plants have been found recently in the Ho Lang Shan range of Mongolia and suggests that ‘Pfitzerana’ may have originally been introduced from there by the French missionary David around 1866. It should be added that ‘Pfitzerana’ is a tetraploid (Journ. Arn. Arb., Vol. 14 (1933), p. 369).
Clones resembling ‘Pfitzerana’ in botanical characters are: ‘Pfitzerana Aurea’, with golden sprays; ‘Old Gold’, denser and more golden than the preceding; ‘Hetzii’, a vigorous shrub with glaucous foliage.
cv. ‘Plumosa’. – Branches spreading; branchlets short, with dense, drooping sprays. Leaves mostly scale-like. This cultivar was at one time distributed as J. japonica or J. chinensis var. japonica, but it is not the J. japonica of Carrière (see ‘Japonica’). It attains a height of about 3 ft, but more in spread. ‘Plumosa Aurea’ is somewhat more erect and has the foliage green-gold at first, later bronze-gold. There are two variegated cultivars in this group – ‘Plumosa Albovariegata’ and ‘Plumosa Aureovariegata’.
var. sargentii Henry J. sargentii (Henry) Takeda; J. procumbens Sarg., not Sieb. – A prostrate plant producing long creeping stems. Leaves on adult plants all scale-like. Henry described this variety from a specimen collected by Professor Sargent on the coast of the North Island of Japan (Hokkaido) in 1892; it was introduced by him to the Arnold Arboretum at the same time. According to Ohwi’s Flora of Japan this variety is found on sea-shores throughout Japan and also on rocky cliffs in the mountains. It is also a native of Korea, Sakhalin, and the Kuriles.
cv. ‘Variegata’. – A well-marked form in which a considerable portion of the younger growth is wholly creamy white, the rest wholly green. Introduced from Japan by Fortune, one of whose original plants used to grow in the Knap Hill nursery. This variety is of sturdier habit and dwarfer than the type.
J. dahurica Pall. – A procumbent shrub with prostrate or at least horizontally spreading very stout main branches and erect secondary branches. Leaves mainly awl-shaped and spreading, but often scale-like, especially at the ends of the shoots, the scale-leaves rhombic, sharply pointed. Fruits about 3⁄16 in. wide, globular, dark brown with a greyish bloom. Seeds two to four. A native of the Russian Far East, from Transbaikalia eastward to the Ussuri region, in rocky places in the mountains, and of N. Mongolia; closely allied to J. chinensis. It was introduced to Britain in 1791 but probably all the plants now cultivated in Europe and America descend from a later introduction by Parsons’ nurseries, Flushing, USA. These show well the very stout main branches mentioned by Pallas in his original description, but according to Van Melle (op. cit., p. 37) it differs from the ‘type’ in its fruits; he suggests that it may have been raised from seeds collected in Korea. The Parsons juniper is generally known as J. chinensis var. parsonsii Hornibr. (J. dahurica var. parsonsii (Hornibr.) Van Melle), or as J. chinensis ‘Expansa’.