wild new england: The Big Flowers: Spring-blooming Trees

I'd like to present a few of the trees and their flowers I've observed this spring.

In this first shot you can sort of see the drooping cluster of staminate flowers of the sugar maple, blooming in early May (just after the red maples shown 2 or 3 blogs back.) Though the male trees are mostly male, you can make out one pistillate bloom on the far right.

Bark of Acer saccharum, sugar maple.

This was my first sighting of Acer negundo

(boxelder or ashleaf maple)!

I really wanted a look at Fraxinus americana (white ash) flowers this year and had quite a time craning my neck, straining my eyes, and praying for wind storms and squirrels to knock parts down for me. This is a far-up view of a staminate (male) flower cluster.

Here's one fallen on a rock.

and here's a far-up pistillate branch. They're nearly impossible for me to make out.

but FINALLY I found a low-hanging one.

A couple of weeks later, the females are maturing so beautifully.

Fraxinus leafscar below

Betula lenta (sweet, black or cherry birch) showing both pistillate "cones" and staminate catkins.

Betula lenta bark, middle-aged tree.

Ah, Sassafras albidum. I checked on a small stand of young trees nearby every few days and was thrilled to catch them at last. These are less than 20feet high. Darlene and I found a huge one near her place that measured 111 inches around - it's bark was a gorgeous dark cinnamon-color.

Sassafras leaf

This pretty bow of Populus deltoides (eastern cottonwood) was taken by the Fenton river off a storm-damaged tree. We've had some ferocious thunderstorms already!

2-3 weeks later, a cottonwood inflorescence landed on this moss-bed.

The Mighty Oaks

Quercus rubra (northern red oak) far-up shot above and close-up of pistillate blooms, baby acorns.

The strange picture below shows staminate blossoms and newly-forming galls, just a very close-up section of one of the long, drooping male catkins.

This may be Quercus bicolor, swamp white oak. I need a tree-teacher!

this is its bark.

A scarlet or pin oak?

Another guess: bear oak? I remember where these are located so I'll hit the books and take some more looks.

((on my computer the blog stops here, so please click "read more" to continue))

This is a l-o-n-g b-l-o-g... but I looked at a lot of trees, Ma! This is the Walnut Family, Juglandaceae, which includes the hickories (your southern pecan is a hickory, Carya illinoinensis.)

It may be a good year for hickory nuts, shagbark - they fruit every 3 years.

Young shagbark leaflets, they will become MUCH bigger.

old shag bark.

Shown below is a young branch of the pignut hickory, Carya glabra, with ripe staminate catkins.

pignut bark

Above see the magnificent Juglans nigra, black walnut. Look closely and see the stalk of red female flowers. I can't wait to check the nuts later on. There's also a white walnut or butternut, Juglans cinerea, not far from this tree. I think if you double-click the photo, it will enlarge.

Here I observed the Carpinus caroliniana, american hornbeam, in bloom. I wasn't able to make out the sexual parts (no pun intended). The bracts seem to hide them - now I'll have to wait until next year to look again.