Complimentary 
NfiW SERIES VOL. VI NO. 8 
ARNOLD ARBORETUM 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY 
BULLETIN 
OF 
POPULAR INFORMATION 
jAMAICA PLAIN. MASS. JUNE 10. 1920 
Some of the Trees now in flower. The Horsechestnut of southeast- 
ern Europe, Aesculus Hippocustanum, when it is covered from top to 
bottom, as it is this year in the neighborhood of Boston, with its great 
erect clusters of white flowers is the most splendid object among the 
trees hardy in the northern states. There are several varieties of this 
tree in the Arboretum collection but none of them grow to such a large 
size or are as handsome in habit or in their flowers as the original 
tree. The double flowers of one of these abnormal varieties, however, 
have the advantage of lasting longer on the trees before fading. The 
European Horsechestnut only really flourishes in deep cool soil, and 
although it has been largely used to shade city streets in this country 
and in Europe it is not suited for such a purpose for the heat and 
drought of cities often cause it to lose its leaves at midsummer. Its 
place is in parks and gardens and by country roadsides. This tree 
appears to have been more generally planted in western New York 
than in other parts of the United States, probably because Rochester 
has long been an important center of the nursery business. No finer 
individual trees, however, can be found in this country than some of 
the specimens now more than a hundred years old which are grow- 
ing in gardens in Salem, Massachusetts. They show what can be ex- 
pected of this tree in New England where the Horsechestnut ought to 
be a hundred times more common than it is at present. Among the 
red and pink-flowered Horsechestnut trees, hybrids of Aesculus Hippo- 
castanum and a red- flowered American Buckeye, are a number of hand- 
some trees. The best known of these hybrids, Aesculus carnea, is the 
^ ‘red-flowered Horsechestnut’ ’ which is now a common tree in the sub- 
urbs of Boston. More conspicuous when in flower is a red-flowered 
variety known in nurseries as Aesculus Briottii The tree in the Ar- 
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