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Botanical Name: Picea abies 'Pendula'
Common Name: Weeping Norway Spruce
Origin: N. & E. Europe
Location: CSE, CSW
Notable Feature: An irregularly shaped evergreen tree, ‘Pendula’ is an unusual weeping cultivar of Norway Spruce.
Habit: If staked and supported, it can grow more or less upright into a 15 to 25-foot tall tree with a spread of 10 feet; staking will display the pendulous nature of its branches. If not staked and supported, it will mostly spread along the ground as a woody groundcover, reaching 3 feet tall and 10 or more feet wide.
Flower: Monoecious (male and female flowers are borne separately on the same tree); males yellow-brown in large groups; females upright, purple.
Fruit: Purplish violet, turning a light brown. The elongated, cylindrical, 4 to 7-inch cones sit upright on the branch until fertilized. Once fertilized, they gradually turn downward, maturing in fall.
Foliage: Bright green new growth, aging to a dark blue-green. Needles are roughly ½ to 1" in length and feel square when rolled between your fingers.
Bark: Thick with small gray-brown flaking scales.
Interesting Fact: Weeping forms have been around for a long time, among them Japanese maples, Eastern redbuds, flowering dogwoods, cherries, willows, and pines. It’s doubtful that such a habit could give any special advantage to a plant -- other than the fact that we humans love the graceful rise and fall of these mutant plants’ branches and keep them going through propagation.