Called Old Man's Beard in the piedmont of NC, the highly fragrant and fleecy spring blooms start off a pale green and change to pure white over the course of a week. Very graceful appearance. Some winter dieback each year in zone 7b. Limbs moderately brittle. Fragrance wafts for great distances. Blooms are short lived. Transplants well when young.

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A few years ago I did see a fairly big garden center in southeast Pennsylvania selling a few of this Chinese Fringetree, and I have taken two photos of a specimen planted in the Olive Family Collection on the west side of Morton Arboretum in northeast Illinois. The Emerald Ash Borer from China can attack the American Fringetree fatally, being in the same Olive Family. The arboretum has some of the American species in the Appalachian Collection on the east side, but they are not anymore where the American species of Ashes were growing on the west side, where few American ashes are left. The Chinese species has a good variation of leaf characteristics from shorter and rounded in the southern from to longer and pointed leaves in the northern form, but leaves tend to be smaller, thicker, darker, more lustrous, and less elongate than the American species. The erect flower clusters, cymose panicles, are shorter, about 2 to 3 inches long x 2 to 4 inches wide versus the 6 to 10 inch long and wide clusters of the American species. The dark blue olive-like fruit is a little smaller to 1/2 inch long versus the American fruit to 3/4 inch long. I thought the one Chinese specimen in the arboretum had very pretty bark. I like the American Native Plant Movement, so I am not encouraging lots of planting of any woody Eurasian species in eastern North America. Some urban spots would be alright.

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