Salix ×sepulcralis Simonk.
Kemp willow
Tree to 25 m high, widespreading; bark strongly fissured. Branchlets and shoots long, slender, pendulous, shining dark green, rather brittle, hairy at first. Lvs becoming glabrous. Buds densely whitish hairy. Petiole mostly 0.5-1.5 cm long. Lamina 7-17 × 1.5-3.5 cm, lanceolate, shining above, glaucescent below, serrulate, entire on reproductive shoots; apex long-acuminate. Stipules very small or 0, curved at apex. Lvs subtending catkins 1-1.5 cm wide. Catkins ♀, produced after lvs on short leafy shoots, 2.3-4 cm long, narrow-cylindric; rachis villous. Bracts 2-3 mm long, lanceolate or lanceolate-oblong, green, somewhat incurved, pilose towards base; apex ± obtuse. Glands 1-(2), 0.5-0.9 mm long, ovate-oblong or rectangular, sometimes broader than long. Ovary glabrous; pedicel very short.
N.: Poverty Bay, N. Hawke's Bay.
Cultivated hybrid 1988
Along waterways, not common.
FL Aug-Oct.
Kemp willow is mainly grown in E. areas of the North Id where it has been planted along riverbanks and lakesides, as well as in many large gardens. There seems to be more than one ♀ clone of this attractive pendulous willow in N.Z. as there are minor differences in the catkins. However, the lvs are always longer and wider than any other tree willow described above. The common name Kemp willow commemorates a person in Poverty Bay, although this hybrid, S. alba × S. babylonica, originated overseas.
A related and similar hybrid, S. × pendulina Wenderoth (S. babylonica × S. fragilis), is sometimes cultivated in N.Z. and has been recorded wild. This hybrid is present in cultivation as at least one clone of either sex. Some ♀ trees have 2 glands to each fl. and may belong to cv. 'Elegantissima'. When not flowering the pendulous branchlets and lvs, which are as wide as those of S. × sepulcralis, make it difficult to distinguish from that hybrid although the lvs are a little more strongly toothed in the S. × pendulina clones. S. × blanda Anderss. has been recorded wild for N.Z. but the record is unconfirmed. This taxon is now considered to be a cv. of S. × pendulina.
