Your chances of finding a Franklin tree (Franklinia alatamaha) growing in the wild is somewhere between nil and zilch.
The last time one was spotted growing in its native southern Georgia habitat was in 1803 when John Lyon, a nurseryman and plant hunter, found a stand growing near the mouth of the Altamaha River near Darien, south of Savannah. There the river empties into a bay, across which lies Wolf Island National Wildlife Refuge, and the Atlantic Ocean beyond.
Lyon’s discovery was the last sighting, but it wasn’t the first by an English colonist living in North America. Nearly 40 years earlier, in 1765, Philadelphia botanist John Bartram was traveling in that area with his son William when he came across a small grove of beautiful trees not far from the site of Fort Barrington. They noted the trees in the diary of their tour of the region, then moved into Florida before returning to their farm in Philadelphia (today a park and botanic garden).
By 1773 William Bartram had also become a botanist, and he returned to Georgia to continue his botanical work before exploring the Cherokee lands farther west. And he once again discovered the small grove of beautiful trees. He was there in the fall, when the trees had just produced a crop of small, round, woody seed capsules. He gathered a pouchful to bring back to Philadelphia, where he planted the seeds.
It’s lucky for us that he did, because every Franklin tree in the world today, as far as we know, has been propagated from Bartram’s Philadelphia trees. Franklinia alatamaha is a member of the tea family (Theaceae) and a relative of the camellia and stewartia. It is the only species in its genus, which was named by William Bartram in honor of Benjamin Franklin, his father’s good friend. The species name is for the Altamaha River, although William added an intercalary “a,” making it “alatamaha.”
Though extinct in the wild, Franklin trees are available through the nursery trade today, and well worth seeking out and growing where appropriate.
Growing a Franklin Tree
Franklinia is a beauty, with an open and airy habit outlined by leaves that cluster toward the ends of the branches. It grows from 10 to 20 feet tall (or to 30 feet in the Deep South, where it evolved) and from 6 to 15 feet wide. It can be grown as a single-trunked tree or a multitrunked shrub. It needs full sun for its best flowering and fall color. It’s in the autumn that it really shines.
Bloom starts in late July and continues into August, with fewer blossoms into September. The five-petaled flowers form frilled, fragrant white cups about three inches across, each holding a large clutch of yellow-orange stamens. In late summer and early fall, its glossy five- to six-inch leaves turn orange, red or purple.
When September’s flowers are seen against a backdrop of the tree’s leaves in full fall color, the effect is stunning.
Dr. Michael Dirr, expert on woody plants, calls the tree “persnickety,” meaning it’s picky about its spot and not always easy to grow. I can attest to that.
When I moved to Sonoma County, Calif., I bought a Franklin tree for my yard. It lasted exactly one season before it said, “This ain’t Georgia” and gave up the ghost.
However, back East and in the Pacific Northwest, if it’s given a well-drained, peaty soil kept moist but not soggy, it should do well. The tree thrives in USDA Zones 5 to 8, although it may not size up as well in Zone 5, simply because the growing season is shorter than in warmer zones.
Fusarium wilt can be a problem for Franklin trees, but an occasional spraying with a tablespoon of baking soda dissolved in a gallon of water will help keep the wilt at bay. And if you garden where Japanese beetles are thick and voracious, be prompt about picking them off your tree, as they really love eating its flowers.
Franklinia’s roots are fibrous, so once established it doesn’t like to be moved.
It can be propagated by softwood cuttings given gentle bottom heat in late summer, by hardwood cuttings in spring, by layering or by growing out the seed harvested as soon as the seed capsules are ripe. The sown seed must be kept moist and at a temperature between 50 and 65 degrees (F).
Image credits: Flower with fall foliage: Wendy Cutler/CC BY-SA 2.0; Flower with green foliage: Plant Image Library/CC BY-SA 2.0
