what was the leader growth on the plant in hand?????

its hard to make any presumptions.. on what might be a over-fertilized pot plant ...

but it should give you an indication of the future ...

with planting on a slope... i hope you damned up the downhill side... so as to be able to properly water it during the establishment period ...

one google link says 6 to 12 inches.. another.. 25 cm.. or about 9 inches ... another to 145 feet tall ... whats that all about ...

come on.. favor us with a pic ...

ken

Happy to oblige!

close-up

looks like your tip died.. and it sprouted some new buds down an inch or two ... so you will have to select a SINGLE leader in a year or two ... or maybe that is normal ...

you dont put a scale there.. but it surely looks like about the 9 inch leader growth noted elsewhere ...

i found.. it is not uncommon.. that next year.. it might grow less than that.. due to the transplant.. but within a year or two... it will achieve.. and probably surpass that growth rate ... once its ESTABLISHED ....

little tough to count whorls on this one... but if you look at the pic directly above.. you can see needles on the trunk at the top ... and that is last years growth ...

and then just below the whorl contained in that area... you will note .. there are no needles on the trunk ... and that is where the prior years growth is.. and if you can trace further down.. you will see some further change.. like bark color... indicating the year before thats growth ....

sooooo ... you can literally see.. each years growth ...

and in all that.. you should be able to come to some conclusions about how it grows ... taking into consideration.. it was a graft ... and in a pot for its whole life ...

OK ... you learned something today.. now you can go take a nap .. lol ...

ken

Is the Purple Likeangensis Purpurea the same tree? Its in the middle. I think I remember hearing about some labeling problems with this, don't know for sure.

If so I planted this one when it was about 2" tall in 1999. It was moved once. I estimate its 10-11' tall now (6' Fence). The growth seems like it steadily increased each year, maybe 10-12" last year.
I will need to making choices as I planted to many trees to close...

Yes, they're the same. They used to consider it a subspecies of likiang spruce but now it's its own species. It is still labeled both ways, however. Thanks for sharing the photo, it looks like a nice tree. Do you find the cones to be as nice as advertised?

S

The cones will be nice and purpurea as advertised.

The confusion in nomenclature seems to be in regards to the foliage.

Picea likeangensis Purpurea has green needles while Balfouriana has blue. Both have the same cone color.

Thanks for the confirmation they are the same. I got this tree because of the cones. Unfortunately I have yet to see any cones.

You haven't seen any cones and you planted it in 1999??? That seems a little strange, most of my different spruce trees seem to produce cones well before they reach 11-12 feet. I hope I'm not waiting 15 years with no cones on the one I picked up. I planted it near two small abies koreana that are about the same size, if all three actually get cones at some point it should be quite nice.
S

I would agree, that is one reason why I was wondering if they are the same.
It is a nice tree but...

Does anyone else have any experience with picea purpurea or picea likeangensis? I have been trying to find info online about at what age they might begin developing cones, but I have not had any luck. They are quite rare in the US from what I can tell, so there is not much info. I've been thinking about picking up a second one to replace a picea bicolor that died on me, but I don't want to wait 20 years to see any cones when that is picea purpurea's main selling point. Thanks!
-S