Magnolia obovata Seeds | Japanese Bigleaf Magnolia

Japanese Bigleaf Magnolia (Magnolia obovata) with huge leaves and a cream cup-shaped flower — Japanese Bigleaf Magnolia (*Magnolia obovata*): Magnoliaceae, a tall Japanese forest tree with leaves the size of dinner plates.

LATIN NAME: Magnolia obovata

COMMON NAME: Japanese Bigleaf Magnolia

Plant Profile

Japanese Bigleaf Magnolia is a tall deciduous tree of the magnolia family, fifteen to thirty metres in the wild, with leaves up to forty centimetres long clustered at the ends of the shoots. The flowers open in late spring, cream-coloured, cup-shaped and heavily scented, and the fruit that follows is a cone of red seeds hanging on slender threads.

It grows in the cool, moist forests of Japan, from Hokkaido south through Honshu to Kyushu, often on deep volcanic soil in the company of beech and oak. In Japanese country cooking the fresh leaves are used as plates and as wrappers for grilling hoba miso, which is one of the more practical uses ever found for a tree’s foliage.

Science & Biotechnology

Magnolia obovata is one of the Asian umbrella magnolias, related to M. tripetala of North America and M. officinalis of China, and the group is defined by its large leaves and terminal flowers. It is a diploid and crosses readily with its relatives, which is why it appears in the parentage of several garden hybrids.

The bark contains honokiol and magnolol, the biphenyl neolignans that have made Magnolia bark a subject of pharmacological research, and in Japan it has been used as a substitute for the Chinese hou po, though the pharmacopoeial source is M. officinalis. The compounds are studied for anxiolytic, neuroprotective and metabolic effects.

Uses & Benefits

Timber, food wrapper and medicine, in that order historically. The wood is soft, even-grained and easy to work, and it is used for furniture, boxes and carving. The leaves give a faint resinous scent to food grilled on them, and the bark enters Japanese folk medicine.

In the garden it is a specimen for a large space: the leaves are dramatic in spring, the flowers are big and fragrant, and the red seeds in autumn are a second season. It needs deep soil and shelter from wind, which shreds those enormous leaves into rags within a day. Plant it where the wind is broken by other trees, and give it room on the south side.

Growing from Seed

Clean the seed as soon as the cones split, washing off the red coat, and sow at once, since magnolia seed dies if it dries. Hold it moist and cool for four weeks, then sow into a lime-free mix at eighteen to twenty-two degrees. Germination takes six to ten weeks.

The seedling has a fleshy root and a taproot tendency, so use a deep pot and avoid disturbance. Grow it in bright shade for the first summer, then in more light. Plant out into deep, humus-rich soil with shelter from wind, and keep the ground mulched. The first flowers come at eight to ten years.

Our Take

A magnolia for people with room, grown as much for its enormous leaves as for its flowers. Fresh seed, deep soil and shelter are what it needs.

Tree Seeds