Gordonia axillaris Seeds | Gordonia
LATIN NAME: Gordonia axillaris
COMMON NAME: Gordonia
Plant Profile
Gordonia is a slender evergreen tree of the tea family from the subtropical hills of southern China, Taiwan and Southeast Asia, growing eight to fifteen metres with a pale, flaking trunk and a crown of glossy, toothed, dark-green leaves. From autumn into spring it carries large, white, cup-shaped flowers with a dense boss of golden-yellow stamens, and each bloom drops whole, landing face-up on the ground beneath the tree in a scatter of fried eggs that gives the tree its most affectionate common name.
The fallen flowers, the flaking bark and the red young flush make it a four-season small tree, and it is a standard sight on Hong Kong hillsides and in subtropical gardens, where it grows on poor, acid slopes that defeat fussier trees.
Science & Biotechnology
Its classification has moved: long known as Gordonia axillaris, molecular work on the tea family moved the Asian species into the revived genus Polyspora, and current floras file it there while gardens and nurseries keep the old name. It belongs to the same family as the tea plant, and its leathery, toothed leaves carry the family look. Its ecology is that of a pioneer of poor, acid, fire-prone hillsides: it seeds into bare slopes, tolerates the thin soils that follow, and holds its ground where the subtropical forest around it has been cut, which is why it dominates so many Hong Kong and South China hillscapes in photographs.
Its flowering season, autumn into spring, fills the subtropical winter gap that few large trees touch, and studies of urban subtropical floras regularly cite it as a key winter nectar source.
Uses & Benefits
In the garden it is a winter-flowering evergreen tree for acid, poor soil: a slender specimen for a courtyard or a hillside, a tree whose dropped flowers become their own groundcover, and one of the very few large plants that blooms through the subtropical winter. It combines naturally with camellias and other acid-soil woodlanders.
The winter flowers feed sunbirds and bees in its native range, the flaking bark carries year-round interest, and the tree’s pioneer toughness lets it hold eroding slopes in exactly the way its wild hillside role implies. It asks for acid soil, light and patience, and repays all three.
Growing from Seed
Sow fresh seed in spring into an acid, humus-rich, free-draining compost, covering it lightly and keeping it at 20 to 25 °C in bright shade; germination follows within four to eight weeks. Grow the seedlings on the acid side with rainwater where the water supply is hard, and pot on as they fill the container.
Plant out into acid, well-drained but moisture-holding soil in full sun or light shade, spacing for a twelve-metre crown, and mulch annually with leaf mould or pine needles. Water through the first two summers and then leave it; the tree’s hillside toughness takes over, and the winter flowers follow from about the fifth year.
Our Take
The fried-egg tree: white cups with golden stamens dropped face-up all winter, on a flanking, flaking, acid-soil pioneer. A four-season evergreen for subtropical hills and gardens.
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