plantx gardening cercis canadensis texensis mexicana

The redbuds in nature is ussually an understory tree.As you will see in these images we tend to plant it in the open sun as a specimen tree. I think the redbud looks best planted understory a redoak or another large tree. The texas variety is probably the most popular variety, however many eastern redbuds are sold in texas as texas redbuds. The arevery similar in appearance the difference being that the eastern redbud is not nearly as drought tollerant, grows much larger faster,seems to be more vulnerable to pests. The Texas and Mexican redbud are smaller more tollerant of our weather and have a more sculptural growth habit. The Mexican has very small leaves and are some what tomentose or fuzzy and doesn't bloom as prolifically as the texas redbud. When the Mexican redbud was introduced into the nursery trade Dan Hosage a nurseryman started collecting seed from Sanderson, which had a very nice population growing in the dry creeks. I actually went down to Sanderson and collected some seed myself. I still have a Mexican redbud that i grew from seed. The Sanderson redbud is very cold hard and has a very nice branch structure and the bark has a nice whitish grey color. You will see some Texas redbuds which display this same bark color. The eastern redbud tends to have a darker bark.