Ulmus 'Berardii'

The elm cultivar ''Ulmus'' 'Berardii', Berard's Elm, was raised in 1865, as ''Ulmus Berardi'', from seeds collected from large specimens of "common elm" growing on the ramparts at Metz, by an employee of the Simon-Louis nursery named Bérard.

''Ulmus campestris Berardi'', E.-A. Carrière, ''Revue horticole : journal d'horticulture practique'', Paris 1887; p.63
/ref> Carrière (1887), the Späth nursery of Berlin and the Van Houtte nursery of Gentbrugge regarded it as form of a Field Elm, listing it as ''U. campestris Berardii'',''Cultures de Louis van Houtte: Plantes Vivaces de Pleine Terre''
'Catalogue de Louis van Houtte, 1881-2''p.303 the name used by Henry. Cheal's nursery of Crawley distributed it as ''Ulmus nitens'' ''Ulmus minor''">Ulmus_minor.html" ;"title="''Ulmus minor">''Ulmus minor'''Berardii'. Smith's of Worcester preferred the original, non-specific name, ''Ulmus'' 'Berardii' (1888 catalogue).

As with 'Koopmannii', 'Berardii' is treated in some north Eurasian treatises (for example, Krüssmann, 1984) as a cultivar of the Siberian Elm">Johann Gerd Krüssmann">Krüssmann, 1984) as a cultivar of the Siberian Elm ''Ulmus pumila''.Krüssmann, Gerd, ''Manual of Cultivated Broad-Leaved Trees & Shrubs'' (1984 vol. 3) Green, who had examined dried specimens of the plant, also considered it "as possibly a form of ''U. pumila''". A much re-labelled 1820s' herbarium specimen from the Baikal region of Siberia (one conjecture was "''U. siberica'' var. ''pumila'' ?") in the Museum national d'histoire naturelle, Paris, shows 'Berardii'-type leaves, suggesting the possibility of a French cultivation in the early 19th century of a small-leaved ''U. pumila'', later called 'Berardii'. Siberian elms with 'Berardii'-like leaves are present in Russia.

Description

No tree-photographs of 'Berardii' are known, and descriptions of the cultivar vary. It is said to make a bushy shrub or small tree, but these descriptions date from the early decades of its cultivation, and the parent tree was large. Krüssmann and Green state that it has slender upright branches, whereas Späth described the branches as "overhanging". A 1956 herbarium specimen at the Arboretum national des Barres, Nogent-sur-Vernisson, France, describes the source tree as 5 m tall with hanging branches (it includes a small pencil sketch). 'Berardii', Arboretum national des Barres, Nogent-sur-Vernisson, France; with sketch (1956) The leaves have been described as very small, very dark green (almost black), and glabrous, 12–18 mm long. Some herbarium specimens, however, show leaves up to 4 or 5 cm long, with 1 cm petioles, while Bean gives 1.5 to 4 cm long by 0.7 to 2 cm wide. They have been described as strongly crenated or deeply incised by relatively few teeth (four to seven); some herbarium specimens, however, show shallowly indented margins. The leaf-base is cuneate and almost symmetrical. The petioles and new shoots are downy. The leaves have been likened to those of ''Planera crenata'', and to those of ''Zelkova × verschaffeltii''. Krüssmann noted that 'Berardii' is late to come into leaf, Carrière that it holds its leaves late into autumn.

Samarae do not appear in any known 'Berardii' herbarium specimens. From their early dates, some of these are likely to show untypical juvenile leaves.

Huberty (1904) stated that there were variegated forms of 'Berardii'.

Pests and diseases

Chevalier noted (1942) that 'Berardii' was one of four European cultivars found by researchers in The Netherlands to have significant resistance to the earlier strain of Dutch elm disease prevalent in the 1920s and '30s, the others being 'Exoniensis', 'Monumentalis' Rinz and 'Vegeta'. The four were rated less resistant than ''U. foliacea'' clone 23, from Spain, later cultivated as 'Christine Buisman'.

Cultivation

Carrière noted that the original stock plant was still present in the Simon-Louis nursery in 1887. A specimen was grown at Kew Gardens, obtained from the Späth nursery before the First World War. One tree, supplied by Späth, was planted in 1893 at the Dominion Arboretum, Ottawa, Canada. Three specimens were supplied by Späth to the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh in 1902, and may survive in Edinburgh, as it was the practice of the Garden to distribute trees about the city. 'Berard's Elm', a "small tree, slender in growth, with leaves finely cut", was introduced to the USA c.1871, appearing in the catalogues of the Mount Hope Nursery (also known as Ellwanger and Barry) of Rochester, New York,Ellwanger & Barry, ''Descriptive Catalogue of Hardy Ornamental Trees ... at the Mount Hope Nurseries'' (Rochester, N.Y., 1875)Ellwanger & Barry (Mount Hope nurseries), Rochester, N.Y., 1898, p.62
/ref> and of Kelsey's, New York. A specimen stood in the New York Botanical Garden in the early 20th century, and one in the Arboretum national des Barres, Nogent-sur-Vernisson, France, in the mid 20th century. The tree is not known to remain in cultivation, though 51 specimens were reported from the Jūrmalas park in Liepāja, Latvia (2003).

Putative 'Berardii'

An old non-suckering elm in the garden of The Bank of Scotland HQ, off Market Street in central Edinburgh (2025), which produces a very small number of 'Berardii'-like leaves among more regular ones, holds its leaves late like 'Berardii', and, in its form, recalls the 'Berardii' sketch and tracery from des Barres, may be one of Späth's 1902 three. It is known that Späth re-sourced some of his elms, rather than cloning them from nursery-stock – his ''U. campestris cornubiensis'' is not type-Cornish, his ''Ulmus campestris viminalis'' is not 'Viminalis' Loudon, and his ''Ulmus'' 'Tiliaefolia' is not 'Tiliaefolia' Host. The original trees were still present on the ramparts at Metz when Späth began cultivating his clone, which he renamed ''U. campestris Berardii''. At least one 'Berardii' herbarium specimen appears to show that the zelkova-like leaves are not unvarying.bioportal.naturalis.nl, specimen WAG.1853186
/ref>

File:AZ0056 DSC 4176 Market St elm, late April.jpg, Bank of Scotland HQ elm, April
File:AZ0056 Leaves unknown Ulmus Market St. Edinburgh (2).jpg, 'Berardii'-like leaf (bottom)
File:AZ0056 Ulmus. The News Steps, Edinburgh.jpg, Regular leaves
File:AZ0056 DSC 4316 range of Market St samarae.jpg, Samarae of same
File:AZ0056 DSC 4319 Market St elm bole.jpg, Bole of same (right)

Synonymy

*''Ulmus berardii'': Simon-Louis Catalogue, 1869,  p. 96. fig. 7.

References

{{Elm species, varieties, hybrids, hybrid cultivars and species cultivars , state=collapsed

Ulmus
Ulmus articles with images
Missing elm cultivars
Ulmus Edinburgh Spath 1902