Ruud Kleinpaste: Clematis the Climber

A few weeks ago we talked about an “early Spring”, simply because I thought some of my plants were flowering a lot sooner than expected. Especially the Clematis paniculata one of the seven native species of Clematis in Aotearoa. 

Picture taken on Sunday 25 August, 2024 

This is one of my favourite Native, New Zealand Climbers, also known as puawānanga, (flower of the skies). It belongs to the Family Ranunculaceae, the buttercup family – it always surprises me how something like Clematis paniculata belongs to the buttercup group, but then again, our plant taxonomy often has little to do with “resemblance”. 

I planted our Clematis some 6 years ago near the base of a dying old Birch tree. That birch literally karked it in the next six months, so it was the perfect tree for the climber to climb on. 

“Flower of the skies” needs to grow into the light, that’s where the flower buds will develop. The more exposed to sunlight, the better the buds develop. 

Another important consideration is that the roots of the Clematis need to be in moist, cool soils, according to all the old horticulture books. Gardeners translate this to “cool, moist, shady roots and flowers in warm, dry and bright, sunny places”. (I have always questioned the “cool, moist shady roots” bit as when you buy the plants from garden centres, they’ll often be in black, warm and dry plastic pots!) 

Having said that: the soil in which roots grow in gardens tends to be cooler than the conditions in which plants are kept on the Garden centre’s shelves…  

Ever since our Clematis grew up on the old, dead birch tree, the number of flowers increased dramatically. Spring-time flowering is spectacular, and I can’t control myself at this time of the year: always taking pictures as soon as the flower buds begin to adorn the (by now) decaying old trunk. 

Trouble ahead: This old Birch is nearing its last few years of strength. There will come a time when the Clematis will encounter serious struggles as a result of a collapsing, dead Birch! I am already thinking about another site for Clematis: some of the common Ozzie hardwood trees (Eucalyptus, Acacia, wattle, etc) are very tough and long-lasting structures even after death. This may well be a great (and long-lasting) climbing rack for our native Clematis. 

The good thing about training them up a dead tree is the abundance of warm sunlight for the buds. 

A few days ago I browsed through my collection of Clematis pictures on the computer. That’s when I found some pics (and dates) of flowering. All were starting the show in the third week of August. 

And right now – as this program goes to air, they always look like this: 

It looks as if Clematis the Climber is regular as clockwork! 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast
from News Talk STB.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
I know a man who's going to have an opinion
on the Jack Tame theory of seasonal rounding. Cald A,
Good morning, Rude climb pass.

Speaker 3 (00:19):
Seasonal round Hang on, I'm a full disclosure, I didn't listen.
I've been I've been not feeling too well and I've
been working.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
But go on, Okay, So here's the theory. The theory
is that is that we acknowledge that spring starts on
the twenty third of September, not on the first of September,
but that for the sake of seasonal rounding, we round
ford for spring. So we start spring a little bit
early on the first of September, while steep down acknowledging
that technically doesn't start till the twenty third, but we
celebrate the first of September as though it is the

(00:48):
beginning of spring. And then at the other end of
the seasons, when we're heading into the cooler months, we
push things back a little bit so we stick with
the original dates. So, if you like, we round things
forward at the front end, and then we return to
the alternative to the to the actual dates when it
gets to the cooler months.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
Do you really think that people that work on television
can do this science just off the top of their head?
Why else do you think we do the first of September?

Speaker 2 (01:17):
Yeah, this is true, This is true. I mean, yes,
people who are on TV, in my experience, most of
us anyway, can't do much else thinkfully. But yeah, I
mean that they're being said. I'm seeing more and more
blossom around the country, and you know it's I know
that Aucklands had the kind of electrical storms a couple
of times over the last few days, which means they've

(01:38):
got to be some some cool, some some warmer ear
in the in the atmosphere as well, so you know
there is reason to feel like spring is starting to spring.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
I love the way you take the mickey out of me. Fabulous.
I think it's brilliant because that's exactly what what what
I think has happened the last two weeks ago. I
thought we talked about earlier spring and all that sort
of stuff, and it was all to do with my clematists.
My clematist paniculata, which is one of our seven species

(02:08):
of native New Zealand clematists in autioa. And and I've
got I've given a picture to to Leveyes. You'll check
it on the website. The picture I took after we
last week, after we spoke about this on the twenty
fifth of August, shows you a couple of flowers and
a whole lot of bud's going. And I was really excited,

(02:28):
like exactly as you say, the excitement of its becoming spring. Ye,
And it's early now, okay, so let's let's first talk
about clematists. That's fine. It's a plant that I personally
love dearly. It is beautiful, it's such a good native climber,
and it's it's it's a it's called a one pawan aga,

(02:52):
which is flower of the skies, which I think is
a lovely Mato Maori observation word for this thing that
grows upwards and gets the flowers right on top of
what it climbs on. And in my set situation, it's
climbing on an old birch tree that's dead, by the
way and causing trouble because it'll die and the old
thing will collapse. But that's another story. So that's that

(03:16):
is it the flower of the sky for those people
that want to see these white bunicular other flowers. Those
climatis they go in what they say is moist soil,
cool moist soils. But they have to then climb to
the top of their climbing rack if you like. Where
they make their buds and their flowers in warm, sunny conditions,

(03:39):
so cool roots, sunny sunny head if you like. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:42):
Right, So what's going to happen is you've got what
the moment you've got on this old dead birch, right,
So it's going to collapse at some point. Where would
you use what would you know in an ideal situation,
would you have it climbing on a living tree?

Speaker 3 (03:58):
Yes, you do. But the problem with the living tree
is that it wouldn't be as spectacular as it is
on a dead tree that has no leaves, right, because
if you have no leaves, you got more sun. Therefore
you get and you get more flowers. Yeah, you got it.
But here comes to thing. So i've last oh hah,
another one. Last week I had the Advanced Tree Services
at my place literally cutting down heaps of my gum

(04:20):
trees eucalyptus. Right, that would when it's dead, When the
tree is dead, for instance, a dead eucalyptus will stay
for probably a decade or two as still strong enough
to hold things like this, whereas a birch would go
within five years. See that's the difference. So I would
use Acacia eucalyptus, what all that sort of stuff, especially

(04:40):
dead ones of those, as your climbing rack for poniculata
for that particular climatis. So that's what it is now.
So then I went into the garden a couple of
days ago before I sent all this stuff off the libby,
and I took a photo of basically the plant as
it is now. So what people can see now is
today what my clematist looks like. And here comes the thing.

(05:04):
If I go through all my photo on my computer
of clever disponicula, the same one, it is always flowering
from today onwards.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
Really it's very August, yeah exactly.

Speaker 3 (05:21):
And so it's just our excitement. Yeah yeah, god, it
looks good. Did you think? Ah, spring us here? And
that is what this is. Four people on the television
suffer from.

Speaker 2 (05:31):
This is why you need the Jacktime theory of seasonal
adjustment or seasonal rounding.

Speaker 3 (05:37):
That's why I said you are the best one to
take the mickey out of me because I was totally wrong.
It was a regular s clockwork.

Speaker 2 (05:45):
Yeah, very good. Hey, thank you so much, and we
will make sure to put those photos up on the
on the website. They have beautiful flowers, so we'll make
sure we put them up. People can see them at home.

Speaker 1 (05:54):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
to news talks. It'd be from nine am Saturday, or
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