Higher classification Ulmus minor | Scientific name Ulmus minor 'Variegata' Rank Cultivar | |
Similar Elm, Ulmus × hollandica, Ulmus minor 'Argenteo‑Variegata', Ulmus × hollandica 'Wredei', Ulmus 'Camperdownii' | ||
The Field Elm cultivar Ulmus minor 'Atinia Variegata', the variegated English elm, formerly known as U. procera 'Argenteo-Variegata' and described by Weston (1770) as U. campestris argenteo-variegata, is believed to have originated in England in the seventeenth century and to have been cultivated since the eighteenth. The Oxford botanist Robert Plot mentioned in a 1677 Flora a variegated elm in Dorset, where English Elm is the common field elm. Elwes and Henry (1913) had no doubt that the cultivar was of English origin, "as it agrees with the English Elm in all its essential characters". At the Dominion Arboretum, Ottawa, the tree was listed as U. procera 'Marginata', as the variegation is sometimes most obvious on leaf-margins.
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Variegated English elm is not to be confused with the more common Field Elm cultivar U. minor 'Argenteo-Variegata', also known as U. minor 'Variegata', the Silver Elm or Tartan Elm, which has similar markings but narrower leaves.
Description
Weston described the tree as having leaves striped, spotted and margined with white. The photograph in Krüssman (1984) of a specimen in Schönaich-Carolath Park, Hamburg, shows the typical, almost orbicular leaves of English elm, but variegated. In other respects the form of the tree is similar to the type. The tree, which is the only variegated English Elm in cultivation, sometimes produces variegated suckers.
Pests and diseases
'Atinia Variegata' is vulnerable to Dutch elm disease.
Cultivation
'Atinia Variegata' has been in commerce since the 18th century. The tree remains in cultivation in the UK, United States, and Australia.
Notable trees
Gerald Wilkinson reported that "great specimens" of variegated English elm could still be seen in the early 1970s at Kew, at Kenwood (near the West Gate), and in many large gardens. The Kenwood specimen seen by Wilkinson may have been the same tree noted there by Augustine Henry, measuring 75 feet in 1909.