What the? OK, a lot going on here. That's yellow-leaved forsythia for one, posted about here. And the big-leaved bamboo is posted here. But what is the white-leaved action in the center?
Those are the young leaves of my Silver Cloud redbud tree. They unfold before their chlorophyl even starts developing, looking somewhat like the translucent seek-pod disks of the "money plant", Lunaria annua. Well, in shape if not in coloring.
Chlorophyl does creep in—otherwise the Silver Cloud couldn't grow—but the leaves remain satisfyingly "whited" the whole season. This is still a young Cloud, but it's a (small) tree eventually. So it will shade both the bamboo and the forsythia someday. Notice that there are two pairs of horizontal wires in the picture. They are the bottom rungs of a series of wires strung up to ten feet high.
I'll gently flatten my Silver Cloud to them so it will be a Silver Disk or a Silver Slab floating with tidy serenity above the wilder duke-it-out of the forsythia and the bamboo. (Yes, I can hear your exhasperation: "Louis, can't you just let something grow?" Well, yes, I could, but I worry that then my garden could be confused with yours. (Ouch.))
And also, the frame those wires are attached to had to be there anyway: It's a stabilizing end section to my Belgian fence of beeches. (I'll post about those soon not to worry. And yup, I couldn't just let the beeches "grow" either.) Further, Silver Clouds welcome some shade, and this was about the only semi-shady spot I had left. And lastly because I never heard of espaliered redbud trees, let alone an espaliered Silver Cloud redbud. So of course I had to try it.
And—right!—someday this redbud tree will live up to its name and bloom. The flowers aren't red at all, even the buds. A hot lavender actually. Check out my video here. The buds emerge all along the trunks and limbs, not just from the tips of the branchlets. So espaliering a redbud should produce a singular floral effect too.
Stay tuned.