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Juniperus scopulorum 'Tolleson's Weeping' (Tolleson's Blue Weeping Juniper) - A graceful, weeping evergreen tree that grows to 25 feet tall by 15 to 20 feet wide with long bluish-green scale-like foliage hanging from the pendulous branches.
Plant in full sun and give deep and infrequent watering. It is very cold hardy and is listed for us from USDA zone 3 (-30 to -40 F) to zone 9. This is very striking and unusual looking plant with weepy gray foliage that is reminiscent of a tree with hanging Spanish Moss and giving it a somewhat ghostly feel. Great as a large-scale screen or a large feature plant and also looks good planted near a water feature, so long as the soil does not remain moist.
Juniperus scopulorum is native to the western US in the Rocky Mountains from British Columbia and western Alberta south to Arizona, western Texas and northernmost Mexico where it grows from 1,600 to nearly 9,000 feet in elevation on drier mountains and foothills and northern plains. The junipers are widely distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere with the genus name an old Latin name used by Virgil and Pliny with the specific epithet from Latin with the meaning "of rocky cliffs" in reference to where this species often occurs.
'Tolleson's Weeping' is selection that was thought to originated sometime around 1945 in the US and named as we have it listed, but it is sometimes seen listed as 'Tolleson's Weeping Blue', possibly because there is also a form called 'Tolleson's Green Weeping'. Mildered Mathia in her 1979 Publication An Annotated Checklist of Woody Ornamental Plants of California, Oregon and Washington (UC Press) listed this plant as Juniperus scopulorum 'Tolleson's Weeping'. We have grown this great plant on and off since 1985 and we had a large specimen at the entry of the nursery before road widening construction removed it. The is a very large and nice specimen of this tree in the Los Angeles County Arboretum.
This information about Juniperus scopulorum 'Tolleson's Weeping' displayed is based on research conducted in our horticultural library and from reliable online resources. We also will relate observations made about it as it grows in our nursery gardens and other gardens we have visited, as well how the crops have performed in containers in our nursery field. We will also incorporate comments that we receive from others and we welcome hearing from anyone with additional information, particularly if they can share any cultural information that would aid others in growing it.
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