U.S. Department of Agriculture

forest Seroice Research Note SE-299 August 1980

CRYPTOMERIA DOES NOT SURVIVE IN

THE UPPER COASTAL PLAIN OF GEORGIA

by Timothy La Farge l

ABSTRACT.-Nine seed sources of Ctyptomerio japonica from the northern portion of its range in

Japan were tested in the Upper Coastal Plain of central Georgia. Although these sources varied

significantly in their rates of growth in the nursery, only 3 of 180 trees survived after 5 years in the

field.

Keywords: Cryptomeria japonica, seed source, habitat.

A major disadvantage of the native southern

pines in many areas of the southeast, especially of

loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) and slash pine (P.

elliottii Engelm.), is their susceptibility to fusiform rust (Cronartium quercuum (Berk.) Miyabe

ex Shirai f. sp. fusiforme). Although several programs are underway to breed for rust resistance

within these species, this method takes time. An

alternative is to introduce exotic species of forest

trees which are adapted to the local environments

but are not susceptible to fusiform rust. Kraus

(1963) investigated 67 species of forest trees by

growing them in the Olustee Arboretum in Florida, but the primary interest was in naval stores

production, not resistance to rust.

The natural range of cryptomeria is in a region with a climate that has similarities to that of

Georgia. Many areas in that region receive the

same annual rainfall as does central Georgia, but

some areas receive as much as 55 inches more per

year. Mean annual temperature is as much as

10°F cooler than in central Georgia, but the extremes are not so great (USDA 1941; Williams

1963; Good 1964). It was decided to test this

species in central Georgia to determine if it would

survive and perhaps make a suitable forest tree.

The species’ immunity from fusiform rust would

be an advantage in Georgia.

A horticultural variety of Cryptomeriajaponica (L.F.) Don is occasionally planted as an omamental in Georgia with good success. I have seen

several of these fast-growing, vigorous trees

which have no apparent disease problems.

This paper reports the results of a small

provenance test established on the Upper Coastal

Plain of Georgia.*

A monotypic genus, cryptomeria (also called

sugi) is a forest tree native to Japan and China. It

has been cultivated for artificial afforestation for

about 400 years (Toda 1974; Walters 1974). The

wood is soft but strong and durable, and in Japan

it is used for boxes, poles, and general construction (Walters 1974).

MATERIALS AND METHODS

In October 197 1, seed from nine cryptomeria

sources were received from Dr. Carl E. Ostrom,

then Director of Timber Management Research,

USDA Forest Service, Washington, D.C. Source

information and climatic data are shown in table

1.

A germination test by the USDA Forest

Service National Tree Seed Laboratory indicated

‘La Farge is Plant Geneticist, Intensive Loblolly Pine 2Land and facilities donated by the Georgia Kraft

Culture Resources and Development Program, Macon, Company and Georgia Forestry Commission are gratefuliy

Georgia 3 1208. acknowledged.

Southeastern Forest Experiment Station - Asheoille, North Carolina
Table 1 -Or~gm and cbmattc data “i mnc wed sources of xyptomer~a m Japan and of the lest locanon m Georgra

Lot

Closest

weather

Stat,“”

North East

lat.’ long. ElW

Preclpltatlon Temperature

Length

Mm. M.?X A% % of A% A”& of NUI\W

month month annual total htghest lowest M&X Min MO. record

May-Aug.

, height

i___

0 I

b.pC’f Inches

SttD SOURCtS OF (‘RYPTOMCRIA

ISOlYlatS” Hakodatr’

(Southern

Hokkaldo

BCIOSS stratt,

owanl 2 Aktta2

3 (60 “11 south

5 of Owanl)

Joho,] Akrta*

(30 m, south

of Johall)

Yamanokamt Aktta’

(90 m, NE of

Yamanokaml)

Ohara Miyak”*

(5” mt north

of Ohara)

Shuamme Kanaeawa4

125 m, north

of Shuamme)

Shnuoka Tokyo’

(80 m, NE of

Shlruoka)

Houston Co., Hawkmsv’le,

Georgta Georgia

41 48 140 42 109 2 3 7.0

(41 6) (130) Feb. Sept

39 42

(40 301

39 42

(40 12)

39 42

(39 0)

39 36

36 30

35 42

37 18

140 6 3 3 4.1

(141 30) (920) Feb

140 6 33 4 1

(141 0) (1310) Feb.

140 6 33 41

(141 0) (1120) teb.

142 0 98 2.6

DW

8.3

Sept

83

Sept.

8.3

Sept

9.5

Sept.

136 36 94 6 1 14.4

May Dec.

139 48 1 9 1.9 9.2

Jan Sept

83 30 245 2.3 5.4 46.1 39 July Avg Jan. Avg

NOV. July 81.6 49.2

46 6 3 7

729 3 4

72.9 34

72.9 34

56 2 39

99 64 28

61 6 39

44 Jan. 6Jarl 92 48 AW

86 Aug 55 Aug 51 - 7 Jail

44 I eb 9 Feb. 96 48 A%

93 Aug. 60 Aug 56 -I2 I eb

44 beb 9 f eb 96 48 A&

93 Aug 60 Aug 56 -12 Frb

44 I eb 9 t,eb. 96 48 Aug.

93 Aug 60 Aug. 56 -I2 Feb.

53 Feb 11 Jan 99 49 A%

93 Aug 59 Aug. 65 I Jan.

July Avg Jan. Avg

75.6 36.8

101 20 16.9 c

1 5

60 Jan 22 Jan I01 60 Aug.

92 Aug 65 Aug 72 17 Jan.

rEST LOCATION IN CtORClA

110

-3

Ye-on cm

65 20 0 abc’

44 I9.2 abc

22.0 ah

172bc

44 194ahc

44 21.2 abi

44 134d

60 22.4 a

40

‘latttudes, longttudes, and elevations in parentheses are those of the sources themselves.

2Mete”r”l”giCal Office. 1966. Tables of temperature, relative humidity and precipitation for the world (Aua) Part V. London Wt. 0 617 e). Cited after Dr. Ralph A. Read

Oetued), Forestry Sciencer Laboratory, Linc”ln, Nebr., personal communication, October 11. 1979.

3Means not followed by the same letter are significantly different at the 0.05 level

4U S. Department of Agrculture (1941).

an average germination of 18.7 percent for all nine

lots. The seed were sown in the greenhouse on

February 10, 1972, each seed lot to a separate flat.

The resulting seedlings were transplanted to

nursery beds with two replicates on April 12 and

two on April 19. Approximately 2,800 seedlings

were planted in the nursery, but only 329 (12

percent) of these still survived when their heights

were measured on September 25, 1972.

The seedlings were lifted on February 20,

1973, and hand planted (grub-hoe method) on

February 21 in Houston County, Georgia. The

soil in this area belongs to the GreenvilleMagnolia-Faceville association (Perkins and

Ritchie 1%5). The surface soil layer is a coarse

loam and is underlain by a clayey subsoil. The

aspect is easterly, and the slope does not exceed 3

percent.

No herbicide or other method of vegetation control was used before or after planting. This was

the same procedure we use to establish southern

pine progeny test plantations. The planting was

arranged in a randomized complete-block design

with four replications and five-tree row plots. Plot

size and replication number were limited by the

small numbers of seedlings (19 and 2 1) remaining

in two seed lots (Owani 5 and Yamanokami). A

commercial loblolly seed lot was used as a

control.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Heights were measured in the nursery, but

there was little opportunity for anything other

than observations of the trees in the field.

Nursery Phase

The, field was plowed and disked before In the nursery, differences in height between

planting. The area planted was a portion of a sources were highly significant, as indicated by

larger field formerly planted mostly to peanuts. the tabulation of mean squares:
Source of

variation

Degrees of Mean

freedom squares

Between sources 8 323.70**

Within sources 320 30.39

A student-Newman-Keuls multiple range

test, based on unequal sample sizes (Sokal and

Rohlf 1%9) was applied to the data (table 1). Since

the heights are not correlated with climatic or

altitudinal data, the only conclusion that can be

drawn from the differences in nursery height

among sources is that they suggest stand-to-stand

variation. One reason that seed source may not

reflect adaptation of cryptomeria to environmental variables is that for three decades in the

late 19th century, public and private landowners

ignored seed source when establishing new stands

(Toda 1974). Since the first decade ofthis century,

increasingly careful attention has been given to

genetic quality. However, the kinds of selection

and breeding practices may not produce trees that

reflect adaptations to their place of origin. Also,

the original place of origin may have long since

been forgotten.

Field Phase

It was originally intended that the trees be

measured at the end of the 3rd year in the field, at

which time they were expected to.have resumed

growth after recovery from planting shock. However, they did not survive this long, and, even

after the first growing season, most of the seedlings looked chlorotic and some had already

begun to turn brown.

By the end of the second growing season,

approximately half of the trees had died, and

those remaining showed very little evidence of

growth. In the following three growing seasons

the seedlings continued to decline. They were

finally plowed under in January 1978, when only

three cryptomeria trees remained alive.

If seed representing a larger portion of the

range had been sampled, it is possible that one or

more seed sources might have been included

which would have been adapted to the climate in

central Georgia. However, despite similarities in

the ranges of seasonal temperature and precipitation variations between Japan and Georgia, there

are some differences. At the northern end of

Honshu, the main island of Japan, where the

annual precipitation is most similar to that in

Georgia, the summer and winter temperature extremes are not so great as those in central

Georgia. But in the southern and central portions

of Honshu, where the temperature averages are

also similar to those in the Upper Coastal Plain of

Georgia, the rainfall is greatest, sometimes as

much as 100 inches or more per- year. Growth

rhythms could also be different. September and

October are usually very dry months in Georgia,

whereas in Japan those months are frequently

quite wet.

These negative results were anticipated by at

least one scientist. Professor Haruyoshi Saho of

the University of Tokyo stated that “. . . it is too

dry for Cryptomeria in Georgia.“3 Although the

results of this test in central Georgia appear to

confirm Professor Saho’s prediction, it is possible

that cryptomeria may do well as a forest tree in the

mountains of north Georgia and over much of the

Southern Appalachians, at least at the middle and

lower elevations. In that region the cooler and

wetter climate is more like that in the mountains

of Japan.

LITERATURE CITED

Good, Ronald

1964. The geography of the flowering plants. 518 p.

Longmans, Greene and Co. Ltd., London.

Kraus, John F.

1%3. The Olustee Arboretum: Performance of 67

species of forest trees. USDA For. Serv. Res.

Pap. SE-4,47 p. Southeast. For. Exp. Std., Asheville, N.C.

Perkins, H. F., and F. T. Ritchie

1%5. Soil associations of Georgia. 1 map. Ga. Agric.

Exp. Stn., Univ. Ga., COIL Agric., in cooperation

with USDA Soil Conver. Serv.

Sokal, Robert R., and F. James Rohlf

1%9. Biometry. 776 p. W. H. Freeman and Co., San

Francisco.

Toda, Ryookiti

1974. Notes on the Japanese State Government forest

tree breeding project. In Forest tree breeding in

the world, p. 161-169. R. Toda, ed. Ryookiti

Toda, Pub., Meguro, Tokyo, Japan.

U.S. Department of Agriculture

1941. Climate and man. 1,248 p. U.S. Dep. Agric.,

Yearb. Agric. 1941.

Walters, Gerald A.

1974. Cryptomeria japonica (L. F.) Don. In Seeds of

woody plants in the United States. U.S. Dep.

Agric., Agric. Handb. 450, p. 361-362. U.S. Gov.

Print. Off., Washington, D.C.

Williams, Joseph E., ed.

1%3. Prentice-Hall world atlas. 2nd ed. 41 p. PrenticeHall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, N.J.

“Personal communication. February 25, 1972
The Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, is dedicated to the principle of multiple

use management of the Nation’s

forest resources for sustained

yields of wood, water, forage,

wildlife, and recreation. Through

forestry research, cooperation

with the States and private forest

owners, and management of the

National Forests and National

Grasslands, it strives-as directed by Congress-to provide

increasingly greater service to a

growing Nation.

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race,’ color, national origin, sex or religion. Any person

who believes he or she has been discriminated against in

any USDA-related activity should write immediately to

the Secretary of Agriculture, Washington, DC. 20250.