Technical information

Height: 15m

Habit & Growth rate: Ulmus 'Sapporo Autumn gold' is a moderate to fast growing elm, when young can have irregular growth habit but with good formative pruning and with age develops into an excellent oval canopy approximate 8-10m wide.

Foliage: Leaves are narrowly elliptical,serrate, dark green. Young new growth can show a reddish tinge. As the name suggest leaves go a brilliant gold colour in the autumn, better than any of the other elms and is fully deciduous in the winter.

Comments:

The University of Wisconsin cultivar 'Sapporo Autumn Gold' was selected from a group of trees grown from seeds of U. japonica received from Hokkaido, Japan, among which were numerous hybrids of U. japonica X U. pumilla (Smalley and Lester, 1973). If attributes necessary for tolerating urban stresses are sought, elms must be given a high rating. An important rationale for selecting Asian elms is that most of them show some degree of resistance to Dutch elm disease( Lester, 1978). U. 'Sapporo Autumn Gold was selected by Dr E. Smalley in the late 1950s and released in 1973. Since its release overseas it  has proven to be a very tough and shown  reliable growth rates in North American and British streets and Parks.

Ulmus 'Sapporo Autumn Gold' was selected because of its complete resistance to Dutch Elm Disease(currently not in Australia) and since being planted in Australia has proven to survive and do well in many of the tough urban environments. Has shown to grow quite rapidly with regular watering  but not necessary for survival.