The First Dawn Redwood – Remarkable British Trees

The First Dawn Redwood

Growing in Cambridge University Botanic Garden, Britain’s first Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides) is a fascinating tree, not least because of the way in which the species was discovered. In Japan, during 1941, a paleobotanist called Shigeru Miki was looking at fossil sequoias and he noticed a new fossil genus, which he called “metasequoia” (new sequoia). Amazingly in the same year a living tree was found in the Szechuan province of China. Eventually specimens arrived in Beijing in 1946 where Professor Cheng and Dr Hu realised that here was Miki’s fossil metasequoia, alive and well,  three to five million years after it was thought to have become extinct. ^{1 and 2}

The Chinese botanists informed Professor Merrill of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University about the discovery, and in September 1947 an expedition was sent to Szechuan to bring back seeds. By 1948 the Arnold Arboretum was distributing seed to botanical gardens and collectors around the world. However, the seed from which the specimen at Cambridge was grown came directly from a Dr Silow who worked with the British Council in Beijing. ³ This head start allowed Cambridge University to be the first to plant out a Dawn Redwood on British soil.

The Cambridge University Botanic Garden is situated one mile south of the city centre, with the entrance on Bateman Street off Trumpington Road (A1134).  The Dawn Redwood can be found on the south-western edge of the Lake.  The Garden is open all year round and there is a modest admission charge.