per 100 cubic feet.1 The growth of the tree from seed is very slow at first as in the allied species.
History and Cultivation
Tsuga Sieboldii was introduced into Europe by Siebold in 1850. Cones both of this species and of Tsuga diversifolia were brought from Japan by John Gould Vetch in 1861, and the latter species was sent out under the name Abies Tsuga, var. nana. Specimens cultivated at Kew as Tsuga Sieboldii, var. nana, belong to Tsuga diversifolia.
Though both species have been introduced long enough to prove their hardiness in favoured parts of the South of England, we have never seen even a moderately large tree, and doubt much if either species will attain timber size in this country. The Japanese hemlocks seem to prefer a light moist rich soil, free from lime, with shade and shelter from cold winds. They will not grow at all on the limestone soil of Colesborne. The best specimen we know is in the garden of Mr. W. H. Griffiths at Campden, Gloucestershire, and is about 15 feet high. It bore cones in 1905.
Sargent” says that Tsuga Sieboldii is one of the most graceful and satisfactory of the exotic conifers cultivated in American gardens, where it promises to grow to a large size; but in the garden of Mr. Hunnewell at Wellesley, Massachusetts, which I visited in May 1904, I noted that it had been almost killed to the snow line by the exceptionally severe winter of 1903–1904, though it had produced cones in the preceding year.’ (H.J.E.)
' In Industries of Japan, 236 (1889), Rein, who did not distinguish between the two species, probably speaking of Tsuga Sieboldii, says that the finest specimens seen by him were in the forests of Kin-shima-yama in Southern Kiu-siu, where it grows with Picea polita, and equals it in size, attaining 4 to 5 metres in girth. This goes to show that the tree enjoys a warm moist climate.
2 Silva North America, xii. 60.
3 Beissner states in Mitt. D. D. Ges. 1905, pp. 165, 167, that T. diversifolia is hardier than T. Sieboldii, but both of them grow well in East Friesland, and Mayr says that T. diversifolia is hardy at Munich.
