When we moved into the house we first rented and then purchased, we cut down all but about 6 feet of trunk of a scraggly looking magnolia we didn't think was doing well. Our plan was to place a bird house on top hoping to attract Blue Birds. We never got around to building the bird house and the next thing we knew, we had new growth growing from this trunk to include side branches. Here a few years later we have a nicely shaped magnolia tree.
The type we have is an evergreen variety (Southern Magnolia??) that is showy with dark green leaves on the front or top surface and a gold/bronze color underneath. The leaves are large and waxy.
We noticed the last two years the tree had actually produced a few flowers only because we saw the seed pods. We kept missing the flowers themselves. This year I was determined to see them and starting around mid April, I started locating a few flower buds. At first I could only find three but have since noticed several others...mainly up higher.
At first it was hard to distinguish between leaf buds and flower buds but didn't take long to notice the difference. The flower buds are fuller at the base looking like a bulb compared to the leaf buds.
Over the weekend we saw our first flower open in a cup shape. Come evening I noticed the flower closed up. Next morning I found the flower was wide open spilling stamens that would catch on the cup shaped petals. By evening, the petals were turning a Burnt Sienna like color of brown. My understanding is that the flower life is basically two full days before turning brown and petals finally dropping leaving a cone shape that continues to develop into seed pods.
As of yesterday we had two fully opened flowers - both at the point of petals turning brown. There is one bud that is getting close to opening and have found several others at the point in this first sketch.
First two using sketchbook with Fabriano Hotpress paper. TWSBI 580ALR (F) w/#41 Brown ink. QoR and DS watercolors.
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