Dull life! At least genetically.
The U.S. National Arboretum announced Tuesday that cuttings from the original Tidal Basin cherry tree have taken root and developed into self-sustaining plants, continuing the Stumpy saga after DC’s most popular little cherry tree was cut down in May.
That’s right: Stumpy clones are now growing, courtesy of gardeners at the National Arboretum and National Park Service.
There is still a long way to go before these Stumpy 2.0s make their way to the Tidal Basin. About two to three years of growth are required before the little Stumpys can be planted in the ground, and it can take up to five years for these trees to bloom during cherry blossom season.
As Piper Zettel, a horticulturist at the National Arboretum, told News4 in March, “It’s a long process… trees grow very slowly, so we have to be patient.”
But the cuttings have taken root, and that’s a start.
How does the process work?
Before Stumpy was removed from the Tidal Basin in May, the NPS asked the National Arboretum to take clippings from the tree.
In March, we got a preview of the propagation process from Zettel. He used plant material from another Yoshino cherry tree to demonstrate the process that was ultimately used for Stumpy.
First, material is cut from the tree the gardener wants to clone. The National Arboretum collected new spring growth from Stumpy three times between April and May 2024, the arboretum said in a news release.
In most cases, only a few leaves were taken. But since Stumpy was already on the chopping block and had so few branches left, the National Arboretum wanted to give itself the best chance of propagation.
US National Arboretum
The cuttings are prepared by trimming the leaves to reduce the surface area from which water can evaporate. The prepared cuttings are placed in a tray containing soil, plant nutrients and rooting hormones specially mixed by the arboretum to start plant propagation.
The trays are then placed in a propagation greenhouse and left in ideal conditions until roots have formed. In the greenhouse, arboretum staff can control temperature, humidity, light and water content so that all samples have the best chance.
US National Arboretum
According to the National Arboretum, eight weeks after preparation and processing, the Stumpy cuttings had developed a root system and were planted in individual pots.
The new “self-sustaining plants” are still very vulnerable, the National Arboretum warned in a press release.
“The new trees still have a long way to go, but we are doing everything we can to ensure the NPS receives strong, healthy and vigorous trees,” Zettel said in the press release.
If these efforts are successful, the strong baby trees can be replanted in the soil near the Tidal Basin in two to three years.
Will the new trees look like the original Stumpy?
Even when Stumpy 2.0s grow, you may not recognize them, even though they are genetic clones of the original.
Stumpy was small, crooked and hollowed out because he was flooded with brackish water every day, giving him the shape we all know and love, but it wasn’t good for him.
The goal of the NPS seawall reconstruction and the National Arboretum’s propagation project is to “create ideal environmental conditions for the newly planted trees,” Zettel said in March.
The new trees will be healthy and happy, but without “the same life experiences that shaped Stumpy,” they won’t have Stumpy’s “unique shape,” Zettel said.
Have you met Stumpy?
Stumpy – in case you missed his big moment – was a popular cherry tree at the Tidal Basin between the Ohio Drive Bridge and the Jefferson Memorial.
He was visibly different from many of his brothers at one of the county’s most popular flower venues. But he did his best and the county loved him for it.
The tree was nicknamed “Stumpy” in 2020 by a Reddit user who posted a photo on the r/washingtondc subreddit and joked that the tree was “as dead as my love life.”
Yet despite his largely dead appearance, Stumpy bloomed that cherry blossom season—and every spring thereafter.
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began, affection for the crooked, ailing little tree was pouring in in the comments section. But Stumpy’s resilience struck a particular chord as COVID cases rose and the country went into lockdown.
The symbolism was further enhanced when Stumpy’s stubborn blooms reappeared the next spring and the following, just as Americans were crawling out of quarantine and returning to something like normal life.
From then on, Stumpy became more and more famous.
What happened to Stumpy?
The very factors that made Stumpy so unique and popular also led to his death earlier this year.
Stumpy was so blunt because of the ongoing flooding around the Tidal Basin. The seawall in that area of the National Mall was slowly sinking into the water and climate change has caused sea levels to rise.
This unfortunate combination meant that during high tides, water would regularly overflow the banks and flood the trees and their root systems – which is really bad for the plants.
Maggie More / WRC
“Too much water for a tree’s roots can be just as damaging as too little,” National Park Service spokesman Mike Litterst said in an email in 2023. “Excessive soil moisture can reduce oxygen levels in the soil, damage fine root hairs, and cause the root system to become unable to absorb water.”
Many of the other trees around Stumpy’s house had already died by the time he became famous. Visitors to the Tidal Basin in 2024 saw dozens of stumps and lots of empty space near the Jefferson Memorial. Sometimes this empty space was filled with muddy, brackish water that flooded the walkways, making them dangerous or even unusable.
For this reason, the NPS announced last spring that 159 cherry trees in the Tidal Basin and West Potomac Park would be cut down to make way for seawall repairs, including Stumpy.
DC did not take the news well. The district mourned. Stumpy received cards and bottles of alcohol. Literal diplomats paid their last respects to him.
But death is inevitable, no matter how many traffic-shattering mascots a life inspires.
And so, on May 24, Stumpy was quietly removed from the Tidal Basin.
WRC
Why couldn’t the NPS just move the original Stumpy?
Stumpy probably wouldn’t have survived the transplant. He was already clinging to life in his place near the Tidal Basin.
In fact, he had barely been able to hold on to anything from the start. According to Litterst, Stumpy was already in what arborists call the “death spiral.”
When we found him in 2020 and started to love him, Because Even though he looks so shaggy, there was nothing you could really do about it.
“There’s so little left of the tree to replant,” Litterst said in March. “There’s no inner trunk left. People ask us, ‘Do you know how old this tree is?’ There are literally no rings left inside the tree for us to count.”
Stumpy fed on fumes from a bark framework, transferring little nutrients to the few branches that bloomed each spring, “and not much more,” Litterst said.
According to the story, the tree was doomed.
If it had remained where it was, the flood would have killed it and the few other trees that are still submerged by the crumbling seawall.
Alex Wong/Getty Images
If the NPS had tried to transplant Stumpy, he could have died from “transplant shock,” Litterst said. It’s a bit like the transplant shock some people experience after organ donation, he explained. Even if the soil, nutrients and sun are compatible with what the tree is used to, the new experience in a different location can be tough on any tree’s root system.
And Stumpy was not in a condition where a transplant was possible.
To save the other trees from the flood and to spare Stumpy an undignified death by transplant, the NPS and the National Arboretum have created a third option: the clones currently growing in an arboretum greenhouse.
This paved the way for the current seawall reconstruction project near the Tidal Basin, which aims to restore the area and ensure that the cherry blossoms retain their beauty for many decades to come.
