I really don't know what these 2 or maybe it was 3 trees are. They seem too light to be 'Akebono', the buds are not as pink as others i have seen, but they are not white enough to be 'Umineko', because buds do have pink tinge to them. the petals look fat and pillowy like 'Umineko', but the sepals seem to have a bit of pink to them and I think 'Umineko' is suppose to be green. These are 2 or 3 young trees, vase shaped, but i would say more flattened vase than upright. at the top of QE, north of the big parking lot and west of where everyone does their Tai Chi, on a path heading to the nice view point over to the South West. Help can anyone ID these?
Where this was originally posted in Riley Park, I wrote: I don't see any hairs - would rule out any 'Somei-yoshino' relative. Sepals don't look long enough or serrated enough for Oshima-zakura, but maybe. It looks so pink, as you said. Maybe it's cold. I'm not ruling out Oshima-zakura.Now that I've seen Anne Eng's photo of the Oshima-zakura in Sunset, that's looking a lot less likely for this, which looks much more delicate, not so much of the knobby branches as in Anne's photo, similar to 'Somei-yoshino'. It would help to also have a photo showing more of the branches. Also, could we see the whole tree? I always looks for upturned branch ends on 'Umineko', and we don't have them pictured here.
Wendy traced Mariko's post #37 in 2009 which indicated that Somei-Yoshino trees, which were not grafted, were planted at the top parking area. All their blossoms look very SY-ish, and I see knobby twigs. So I think these are youthful Somei-Yoshino trees.
