Trees & woodland lore · Western North Carolina field companion
Bracken’s Brown Beauty southern magnolia
Magnolia grandiflora
Bracken’s Brown Beauty southern magnolia foliage; cultivar named by the Wikimedia Commons contributor.☀ Full sun · ◐ Part sun or part shadeShuvaev ↗ · CC BY-SA 4.0Photo contextResized and converted to WebP; no diagnostic content altered.
Cold-hardy, dense selection; give space and shelter from exposed winter wind.
A leathery simple leaf has a smooth edge. Turn it over for dense rusty hairs; their abundance varies by selection.
More growing details
Read the bark
Gray young bark becomes darker and scaly on older trunks.
Fruit & seed
An upright cone-like aggregate releases bright red seeds on slender threads; botanically it is a fruit, not a conifer cone.
Winter character
Persistent leaves and large fuzzy terminal buds offer year-round clues.
Origin & place
A cultivated selection of the southeastern coastal southern magnolia; garden suitability does not make it a wild WNC native.
Compare with Sweetbay magnolia
Sweetbay generally has thinner leaves with silvery undersides rather than the thick rusty felt common here.
WNC Notes
Cold-hardy, dense selection; give space and shelter from exposed winter wind.
Sun Exposure
Full sun–part shade
MATURE HEIGHT (FT)
30–50
MATURE WIDTH (FT)
15–30
BLOOM SEASON
Late spring–summer
BLOOM COLOR
White
FALL / WINTER COLOR
Evergreen
Wet-Soil Tolerance
Moderate
Drought Tolerance
Moderate
LOOK CLOSELY
Two views, a closer look.
Place two photographs beside one another. Compare the overall plant with leaves, flowers, or bark when those views are available. Captions identify what each photograph actually shows. Images are not at the same scale; species references may show different cultivars.
Bracken’s Brown Beauty southern magnolia foliage; cultivar named by the Wikimedia Commons contributor.☀ Full sun · ◐ Part sun or part shadeShuvaev ↗ · CC BY-SA 4.0Photo contextResized and converted to WebP; no diagnostic content altered.Underside of large leaves are fuzzy and coppery-brown. Taxon reference; photograph alone does not establish a named cultivar.☀ Full sun · ◐ Part sun or part shadeCathy Dewitt ↗ · CC BY 4.0Photo contextResized and converted to WebP; no diagnostic content altered.In Winter the fruit is brown and empty of seeds — species reference; cultivar identity not inferred.☀ Full sun · ◐ Part sun or part shadeCathy Dewitt ↗ · CC BY 4.0Photo contextResized and converted to WebP; full original composition retained.
Your margin of the garden.
Saved only in this browser on this device. Export your notes from My garden in the library.
