Gold Rush Dawn Redwood

Growing attractive trees is a great way to fill your garden with wonders, especially if you have room for a collection. In a smaller garden you need to be selective, as space is limited, so stand-out trees are a must. Each tree must earn its place, and be both beautiful and interesting, with changes through the seasons. For something truly special, for even a small garden, stop and take in the beauty of the Goldrush Dawn Redwood. Not a tree to wait around to put on a show, this is a very fast-growing tree, adding as much as 2 feet of growth in a year, so that within a short ten years you will have a graceful 20-foot specimen to show off. However, it can easily be pruned to keep it small indefinitely, fitting into a smaller garden too. This shade tree has many charms, but the big deal is the gorgeous, golden foliage. It is that rare and unusual thing, a deciduous conifer (think pines, spruce and cypress). In spring the bare branches sprout out with sprays of needles that are as gold as butter, making an impressive statement. In summer they hold their color well, with some perhaps turning a little chartreuse. Then in fall they turn beautiful pale gold again, before twirling gracefully to the ground, revealing a tree with rugged red-brown bark that is full of winter appeal.

Growing the Goldrush Dawn Redwood

Size and Appearance

The Goldrush Dawn Redwood is an upright tree with a main central trunk and semi-horizontal side branches. It grows into a graceful narrow pyramid of grandeur and beauty. It is fast-growing, adding about 2 feet of new growth each year, so that within 10 years it will be passing 20 feet tall, with a spread of about 10 feet. It will continue to grow indefinitely, and it could easily reach 50 feet in 20 years and just keep on going. Trees 100 feet tall are known for this species. As it grows the trunk develops a wide base, with flaring buttresses giving it power and strength. The rugged bark is red-brown, with long vertical grooves and ridges, forming large plates on the main trunk.

The leaves are slender, flat needles, about ½ inch long, arranged in two flat rows on either side of a shoot which is up to 2½ inches long. These grow from both new stems and old branches. In fall the shoots and needles drop in a piece, with new shoots developing each year to carry the needles. The foliage begins in spring a gorgeous butter yellow, and this tree really glows. The color is held throughout the summer, with only a small amount of greening to a yellow-chartreuse. In fall the leaves and shoots turn bright yellow, and then drop from the tree. It does not produce cones.

Using the Goldrush Dawn Redwood in Your Garden

This superb tree is perfect for a specimen anywhere in your garden. It is perfect for planting at the edges of wooded areas, or on a lawn. It also makes a dramatic hedge or screen, and since, unlike most other conifers, it can be pruned hard, you could keep such a hedge tall but narrow. It is also a great choice for a bonsai tree, which would really show off the golden leaves. Because it can be easily pruned, it could be kept narrow and compact even in a smaller space, so with a little care you could enjoy this tree even in a courtyard, Asian garden or any smaller garden.

Hardiness

The Goldrush Dawn Redwood grows well from zone 5 to 8, and in zone 9 in the northeast.

Sun Exposure and Soil Conditions

You should place the Goldrush Dawn Redwood carefully for sun exposure. It is best with morning sun and afternoon shade, or, if possible, with light full shade in summer. A little to the east or north of large trees, with clear sky overhead, would be a good location. The gold coloring is subject to scorching in hot sun, especially if the soil is dry, so water regularly or plant it in damp soil. It will grow best in rich, moist, soil, including wet ground. It will grow happily in ordinary garden soils, but not grow so well in very alkaline soils, or in dry, sandy soils.

Maintenance and Pruning

The only care needed is to avoid periods of drought during the summer months by regular watering, especially during the first few years. Dry soil makes sun-scorch more likely. This tree can be pruned in spring, even cutting back to bare wood and large limbs, which will re-sprout. It can therefore be trained into a very narrow form, to fit into a smaller space.

History and Origin of the Goldrush Dawn Redwood

When seeds of the dawn redwood, Metasequoia glyptostroboides, were brought to America in 1947 by the Arnold Arboretum, just a few years after this tree was first discovered by Chinese botanists, it caused a sensation. Previously it was thought to have become extinct 20 million years ago. Now it could join the other two California redwoods – coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) and giant sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum) as one of the world’s great trees. It turned out to be fast-growing and easy to grow. In nature it grows mostly in damp or wet soils, but in gardens it grows well in ordinary soil.

In 1974 the New Oji Paper Company in Japan was using X-rays on seeds to try and find useful new forms of the dawn redwood. One produced a golden seedling, and in 1977 it was planted at the Kameyama breeding station of the Institute for Forest Tree Improvement, in Mie, Japan, a department of New Oji Paper. In 1993 branches for rooting were sent to Pieter Zwijnenburg Jr., in Boskoop, the Netherlands. That nursery released the tree in 1997 as ‘Goldrush’, but New Oji Paper had already called it ‘Ogon’, which means ‘gold bullion’ in Japanese, so that is the official name for this variety of the dawn redwood. The tree came to America in the late 1990s, and it was first grown by Larry Stanley & Sons nursery, in Boring Oregon, who distributed it misspelt as ‘Gold Rush’. The name ‘Golden Mantle’ is also sometimes used for this tree.

Buying the Goldrush Dawn Redwood at The Tree Center

This tree won the American Conifer Society Collectors Conifer of the Year in 2006, and it is always in high demand. We were very lucky to find some beautiful young plants, grown directly from stem pieces tracing back to that original miraculous seedling. We know the collectors will buy them very fast, so if you want one, order now, before our plants are all gone.