Identifying baldcypress in winter

Another easy-to-recognize tree

I receive so many questions about tree identification that I've decided to write a few articles about some of the most common and easiest-to-recognize species.

The photo above shows a baldcypress in January. After you have gained a little practice in looking at trees and identifying them, you would not mistake this tree silhouette for anything but baldcypress (Taxodium distichum). Distinguishing features in winter include:

• The very strong, very straight trunk
• A lack of major side branches
• Narrow, conical or columnar shape; much taller than it is wide
• A few reddish, needle-like leaves still clinging to the branches.
  

This baldcypress is growing in a location that is higher and dryer than we might expect to see. Although baldcypress does well at water's edge, it will also grow in dryer circumstances when it receives plenty of light and enough moisture. This tree was purchased and planted here, I'm sure, rather than growing from a seed.

When this tree becomes mature, its top will become flatter and it will probably develop a few larger side branches. However, it will still be a fairly narrow tree. Baldcypress may exceed 100 feet in height in ideal conditions, and its spread will typically be about 1/3 of its height.

The photo at left gives a closer look at the trunk of a baldcypress. Here you will find a few more clues to identification:

• Bark often has reddish-brown tones. (Baldcypress is a member of the redwood family).
• Bark peels (exfoliates) vertically in narrow shreds
  
• Reddish, dried leaves lying under the tree. (When in doubt always look for a leaf!) 
• Also look for baldcypress fruit on the ground or still on the branches -- hard wooden cones about the size of a ping-pong ball or smaller and covered with largish scales.
  

American beech in winter

An easy tree to identify

• Q. Which tree trunk in this photograph is an American beech?
• A. The American beech is the second large trunk from the right.

American beech (Fagus grandifolia) can be easily identified, even at a distance and even in winter, by its very smooth, silvery-gray bark. A strong second hint is the bleached-out, dead leaves still clinging on the tree in January.

Beeches grow throughout most of the eastern United States. Where you see one beech tree, you will often see several. The American beech is the only member of the beech family known to reproduce through root suckers. Root suckering of beeches is more common in the northern part of its range, where thickets of beech or many saplings clustered around a larger trunk may be seen.

Beechnuts are a valuable wildlife food. In American Wildlife and Plants, authors Martin, Zim, and Nelson list 17 species of waterfowl, game birds, and song birds that eat beechnuts. Animals that have been observed eating the nuts include black bears, deer, beavers, red and gray foxes, porcupines, squirrels, chipmunks, mice, and of course, squirrels. Deer also browse the leaves and twigs.

Along the rural backroad of Todd County, Kentucky, where I photographed this beech, half a dozen beech trees grow within a hundred yard radius of this tree. This group of beeches grows on a northwest-facing, steep, fairly moist hillside above a small, narrow valley ("holler") where a creek flows.  I think the location could be described as a "messic ravine." 

In maturity, the American beech is a tall, broad tree -- up to 100 feet in height and 75 feet in width. Beeches are slow-growing trees that usually live 200-300 years, and they are strong-limbed trees that resist weather damage. The beech in the photo is probably several decades older than I am!

Dirr's Hardy Trees and Shrubs

Excellent, but not superior

Note: I don't do affiliate advertising for books. The following is simply my opinion.

I have a new tree book in my library -- Dirr's Hardy Trees and Shrubs: An Illustrated Encyclopedia by Michael A. Dirr. It falls a little short of my high expectations, initially, but I still expect it to be a very useful reference. Perhaps in time, I will cherish it as dearly as do most of its reviewers.

The book has hundreds of beautiful color photos of over 500 hardy species of native and exotic trees and shrubs. In the foreword, the author notes that the plants covered in the book will grow in zones 3 to 6, and most will grow in zones 7 or 8. For most species, a photo that depicts a typical, mature plant is provided, along with photos of any particularly ornamental characteristics of the plant.

Many of the plant descriptions include the names of attractive cultivars that are available through nurseries. Unique growing conditions needed by the species or cultivars are mentioned, as well as some of the negative characteristics such as unattractive winter foliage, susceptibility to disease, etc.

My main criticism of the book is that the type of information provided for one species may not be provided for the next. The author wrote about the characteristics of each plant that he considered most important. Sometimes comparisons of specific characteristics between two or more species are possible from his writing, but often not.

For complete sets of data for native species and for comparisons of species, I'll still be turning to Native Trees, Shrubs, and Vines for Urban and Rural America: A Planting Design Manual for Environmental Designers by Gary Hightshoe. For me, Dirr's beautiful photos and engaging descriptions will  be a supplement to, not a substitute for, the vast quantity of tabulated data presented by Hightshoe.

I should add that both of these books focus mainly on plants of the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. If you live in the western U.S., many of your native species will not be found in either of these volumes.