It was perfectly hardy in a container in my garden for about 4 years, until last winter when it was placed by a helpful friend during a mad late fall clean-up in a rather obscure location where it neglected to get watered and dried out completely :-( The non-variegated form has grown in my garden for good number of years and has become a rather impressive small evergreen tree. Delightful scent when in bloom.

Due to a stretch of mostly mild winters Azara microphylla, including 'Variegata' is seen rather often in Seattle gardens at the moment. See Jacobson, TREES OF SEATTLE - SECOND EDITION for current locations and dimensions of specific examples.

Gardengal, would you say you have a sheltered location for your tree? Is being on the east side of a house but 20 feet away considered sheltered or would it have to be a foundation planting? There are big Red Cedars in two directions too, to cut wind.

As my garden is rather densely planted, I'd not consider anything in it very exposed :-) My azara is also located on the east side, but a bit closer than 20 feet (12'?) and on the edge of a large patio, in one of the most open areas that exists on my property. It also survived several years in a smallish container before being planted in the ground. A. microphylla is a lot hardier than many assume - a number of resources list it to zone 7. I am aware of several Azara serrata in the Seattle area that are obviously well established, have grown into sizeable small trees and this is generally considered to be a more tender species.

Thanks, that is encouraging. I can protect it in winter for a few years. The fragrance sounds wonderful. Have you gotten any fruit?

Not that I've noticed, but I wasn't exactly looking for any :-) The fruit would not be the primary reason I'd grow this tree.

Both the typical green plant and the variegated cultivar can be seen growing in various exposures at the moment, for reason stated above. Ciscoe has a variegated one 25 ft. high. There is an old green one of similar height in the UW Friendship Grove (and one 40 ft. high in the Seattle arboretum) but most seen in yards here now are post-1990, the last year there was a real killer winter. You really should look at Jacobson's book, addresses for several well-established 'Variegata' visible from streets are given.

Seems like you have said before you were in Portland area or elsewhere in Willamette Valley. The climate is more continental down there, sometimes southern hemisphere stuff like this does not overwinter for as long as up here as we do not get as cold during severe winters as many parts of the valley. As you go down the valley winters become significantly colder, rather than warmer even though you are traveling southward. In last record winter Eugene-Springfield got as cold as -17F in some places.

Seattle seems to have a perhaps unique wealth of trees, even nearby Vancouver, BC and Portland do not produce the same impression, either when visiting or when looking at the tree guides written for all three cities. Part of this will be due to the climate conditions.

Parts of Portland near the Willamette are maybe almost as mediated in temperatures as Seattle, but where I live N of Portland is not so. Oh well, I already bought it on impulse then looked it up later, so I will just hope for the best. My planting sites on the south side of my house by a concrete wall are all taken so it will just have to take its chances. The nursery where I bought it has it growing for the last 6 years outside. I should know better than to just buy some cute little plant. But it may be worth it for the fragrance. And maybe it will survive a few years+. Even when temperatures get very cold putting a tarp over a plant can save it. And winter lows have been slowly getting higher over the last several years. My breba figs make it through most years to ripen the next year on Negronne.

Down here there have been some bad cold snaps since 1990. One year it didn't frost until Dec 20 and then proceeded to get down to 6*F. That killed my 8' Eucalyptus supposedly good to 0*F because it hadn't hardened off.:-(

No protection for mine; wintered over an extended 15 degrees easily with no damage at all.

Portland has no salt water in immediate proximity to moderate its temperatures, unlike Seattle. And it does have a huge river gorge bringing cold, stale air to it from the interior. Seattle doesn't. Seattle is nearly all maritime, whereas Portland is a mix of maritime (from the ocean) and interior conditions. The analog up here is the western Washington valley and foothill climate (Sunset 4). There are quite a few plants that overwinter in Seattle long enough to reach full development that don't down there. Where Portland has an advantage is in hotter summers.

Being (usually) seedlings of wild species rather than grafted clones, gums vary in hardiness even in the same seed batch. No young, untested eucalyptus you buy will be known to be hardy to a single, particular temperature. Representative ranges, probably of rather loose accuracy are given for each species in references such as the table in the Sunset WESTERN GARDEN BOOK.

Sean Hogan thinks Portland can grow anything Seattle can and then some, because in Seattle it is always cold and we don't have summers. I refrained from arguing with him in the interests of brining back as many cool plants as possible in exchange for some of my Agave and Yucca seed collections.

The 'best microclimate' and mesoclimate in the Northwest really depends on what you want to grow. I hope we get a nice cold winter this year to knock off some of my tender stuff that is just getting overgrown.

On the other hand, we have more heat to grow tomatoes.:-)
But not enough for okra, melons, etc. though there may be people who have some success with some of these.

I planted my Azara yesterday so I hope it will survive. My variegated Hebe came through last winter's late cold snap unprotected. I can put something over it when it gets cold. I've seen roses blooming in December at Christmas and I wouldn't see that where I live, so Portland is a lot warmer than here, though it may not hold a candle to Seattle.

The Azara foliage is really nice but it's always a plus for me if there is hopefully an edible aspect to a plant as well. My Eleagnus ebbingei supposedly have edible fruit but I haven't gotten any fruit from them, but I saw fruit on one up in Seattle near the sound.

Good luck with that azara--keep us posted. I saw some fun heavily-fruiting Eleagnus at Sky Nursery this past weekend. I was very tempted! I tend to like plants (shrubs and trees anyway) that have some sort of edible aspect as well. I'll plant a pear or a medlar (love them!) over a flowering cherry any day (though I know they're lovely and I respect people's different tastes etc etc etc).

I'm always envious of Portland's weather when I'm visiting, and my Portland friends are always envious of ours when they visit here, so it all evens out I suppose. And my friends from the midwest are always envious of Seattle AND Portland weather in winter, and family down south envious of both in summer, lol.

Keep us posted on that azara!
Take care,
Grant

There are actually a ton of edible ornamentals that can be grown here, way more than what is offered by Raintree or One Green World.* One could have a pretty normal-looking plant-oriented garden with substitutes for common ornamental-only types that also have some fruit, nut or other edibility aspect. There's even an "edible" camellia easily found at local outlets (C. sinensis, the tea plant).

Recently I got around to stopping and verifying the suspected identification of a tree I noticed awhile back growing out over a street in northwest Seattle. It was, in fact Aristotelia chilensis--an evergreen, ~shrubby (2-trunk) specimen 20 ft. high, with (small) edible fruit all over parts of it right at the time I was there.

*See Facciolia, CORNUCOPIA II (or subsequent edition, if there is one) (Kampong Publications) for huge range of edible plants available

I have a wide variety of edibles but no longer grow them exclusively. Thanks for the reference, Ron. Here is a photo of the variegated leaves. They're the cutest I've seen since my Caryopteris divaricata Snow Fairy last year that didn't survive the winter.

We have two 15 yr old Azera which have grown to a height of about 30 feet. They are located in a part of the garden that receives direct morning to early afternoon shade. During summer months, they are watered by a drip system on a timer. They have done well until this summer?--Large sections of the leafs have turned dark brown/black in about 1 month. We have been given three inconsistent explanations--too much rain this past winter and spring--insufficient water this summer--root fungus. None of the surrounding plants appear to be in any distress.

If you are in USA ask your state Extension branch office about testing your plants for pathogens, to find out exactly what is going on - and what may be done about it. Timing would certainly suggest they were affected by the weather this past winter and spring, but it could also be a coincidence.