Colourful conifer

That is gorgeous unusual to me, from a distance it looks like clusters of roses.

Gosh i don't think I've ever seen one so covered in cones how old is it Gill , I love it !

Lovely surprising colouring for conifer flowers, as I suppose they are. Amazing how some plants tolerate being dug up and moved Gee.

I'm not sure what species this is - it's only about 4 foot tall and I've had it for several years (can't remember how long really). The red bits have now turned brown and are crumbly! It would be interesting to know more about it. I will have a look through my box of labels to see if there is one there relating to it :)

never seen that on a confier before! looks lovely

I've been through my box of plant labels and discovered that this is Chamaecyparis lawsoniana 'Little Spire'. The red cones are male apparently, slow growing but can reach 2.5 metres!

thanks, Gee, I'll hunt that up. lol my Buddliea label says it can go up to 4 metres - if I'd read that in the shop I might not have bught it!

it can be very tricky about how much shrubs and alleged small trees grow. Yesterday on patrol with my new extending loppers i found the male self seeded holly with flowers like privet had surged up to about 7 feet! Oh no you don't thought I and slashed it back to where I wanted it to be. Also the corner camellia was chopped back rather viciously, as it was top heavy and leaning forward. Difficult to do with some conifers though. Buddleja can be controlled by chopping back each spring and not allowing it to get rampantly thick and high. You just have to be the one in charge I suppose.

This little one is behaving at the moment but I will watch it carefully :) I cut my buddleia back hard each year - it was supposed to be one of those small ones too.

I'm keeping an eye on Buddy, and will trim back any wayward stems and keep the whole thing more or less tidy.

I usually look at the "mature height" on labels and skip those that will be too big - even if it'd take 20 years to acheive it! Not fair on a plant that naturally gorws tall to keep choping at it, and not much fun for the gardner, either. Just forget to check this time. Probably just as well as I did want one!