Blue vs. Green

[bonsai barry]

I thought this photo made an interesting contrast between the color of needle of two different varieties of juniper. One is "blue rug" and the other is "San Jose". Both are healthy plants but the blue rug changes hue during the winter. You need to click on the thumbnail to see the difference.

 

[John Ruger]

yeah, and those contrasts can be freaky if you're not aware that they are normal. I sometimes feared the plant was dead with a blue rug until spring would come along.

 

[Stan Kengai]

I love blue rug juniper in the landscape. You can walk on it and the only thing that happens is the foliage gets more compact. I have an area in the yard with them that got overrun with weeds, so I hacked them with the lawn mower several times, and they formed an extremely dense mat that very few weeds could grow through. Too bad their trunks are not conducive to bonsai, or maybe I just haven't tried long enough.

 

[bonsai barry]

I love blue rug juniper in the landscape. You can walk on it and the only thing that happens is the foliage gets more compact. I have an area in the yard with them that got overrun with weeds, so I hacked them with the lawn mower several times, and they formed an extremely dense mat that very few weeds could grow through. Too bad their trunks are not conducive to bonsai, or maybe I just haven't tried long enough.

I have a blue rug with a nice trunk. This spring I am working on grafting a few of the branches closer to the trunk to make a decent Shohin.

 

[mc4mc44]

I've always been amazed by the winter color on junipers. It's frightening the first time i see it for the winter, even if i know they're fine. I have a couple Procumbens nana, a San Jose and a RMJ. The RMJ gets the purple bronze color too, but not as extreme as the blue rug in the pic! On very cold mornings i'll go outside and it's almost a pure purple, but it changes so fast that by midday it's back to a greenish blue. The nana's get a little bronzed, and the san jose never really changes at all. I guess the softer the foliage the more winter color they get.

I also have an eastern white cedar, it gets the purple bronze color too. So do all the ones in the landscape in my area. It might get even more color than the RMJ.

Does anyone know exactly why they get the color in winter? Is it just because it's not photosynthesizing as much?