Can someone ID this tree? Located on Burrard and 2nd ave in the park? Small tree/large shrub glaucous leaves Lanceolate alternating leaves smooth margin veins are a little reddish somewhat pendulous branching Thanks a bunch!
Re: Please ID this tree Thanks for posting this, schneidn. Nyssa is a tree I'd wanted to learn, but didn't seem to be able to recognize anything distinctive about it, even after going to look at the one you posted. But yesterday, across from the west side of Coopers' Park, north side of False Creek east of the Cambie Bridge, I found a double row of them while I was checking out a Chinese Wingnut. I was even pretty sure about the ID before I found the fruits. Here are photos of the Nyssa and the location.
Re: Please ID this tree Oh man, what is it I should notice that looks different? I see one description of Chinese tupelo, Nyssa sinensis, that includes: "Fruit shape: round, Fruit length: less than .5 inch". I don't think this fits that description, but it says that for the American N. sylvatica too. I'm attaching a photo of the Nyssa sylvatica at the UBC BG North Garden next to the Pavilion that shows fruits that seem to be heading toward what the ones I posted look like. [Edited: I'm adding a bark photo] Nyssa ogeche: Ogeechee Tupelo has fruits to one inch, also round. That somehow doesn't sound like something I'd expect to find here, even cultivated. [Edited] So much for that comment about not finding it here. See posting #21. UBCBG has one.
Re: Please ID this tree The leaves in that last picture look the same as the street planting also. The leaves of this species are variable in shape. The other one looks like an avocado plant. There was one for years in a ditch at the Lam garden, and they had it quite awhile ago at Van Dusen as well. A tree near the edge of the gardened part of Heronswood appears to be (or may be known to be) this species, it could be large for this region. Some streets down here have had plantings of it, don't know how many of these have succeeded - many street etc. plantings here do not get watered during summer - the area is full of wilted trees at this time of the year. Jacobson, Trees of Seattle - Second Edition (2006) says these Nyssa sinensis plantings date from the 1990s on - and that the leaves are duller than those of the American species, as well as being larger. This commercially offered stock probably originated with Piroche Plants. Presumably there are similar plantings of it up there also.
Re: Please ID this tree Here's the Nyssa sinensis in the Asian Garden at UBCBG. Spent flowers, no fruits. The bark looks quite different from what wikipedia shows for N. sylvatica [edited: and I've added a bark photo for that to posting #7]. The trees I posted might be too young to have distinguishing bark characteristics. I'm a little confused. Do we think the first tree posted looks like this Nyssa sinensis, and the ones I posted look like the UBC garden's Nyssa sylvatica?
Re: Please ID this tree They're all N. sylvatica except the last one, because the street tree row is the same as the N. sylvatica at UBC. You can see how before the first UBC tree was shown I thought the second set (the row of street trees) was N. sinensis, looking at the leaf shapes. But notice that the last one to be posted does not have the glossiness of the others.
Re: Please ID this tree Based on what I can see in these pictures. Ideally you would compare live samples of the street tree row with the labeled specimens in the botanic garden(s) to see where the street planting falls, holding them up next to the labeled trees and observing structural details side-by-side.
Re: Please ID this tree I hadn't thought so. The last one posted is the N. sinensis, which looks different from the others. I thought Ron was just trying to train me to do my own work.
Re: Please ID this tree (Nyssa sylvatica) We're assuming the UBC trees to be correct and using them to compare with and name the row of street trees. What I want to see happen next is additional steps being taken to determine that the street planting is definitely the same as the UBC N. sylvatica shown on this thread. As I live down here, I am not going to be doing anything to assuage that desire myself.
Re: Please ID this tree (Nyssa sylvatica) Tomorrow. I have cuttings of the park and street trees, but they're so different from each other that I want to go back to the park on my way to UBC to see if the leaves generally are really a lot smaller than on the row of trees.
Re: Please ID this tree (Nyssa sylvatica) OK, here first of all is the Nyssa sinensis with a cutting of each of the trees from town. The UBC tree looks more different in the photos than it did to us at the time, but it was pretty clear that it wasn't a match for either of the cuttings. Here is the first tree posted, from the park across from the armory, compared with the Nyssa sylvatica at UBC BG. The leaves on the cutting are quite a bit smaller and relatively narrower, with shorter petioles. None of the leaves on that tree were larger than these. The leaf back of the park tree is more grey. The third photo is the trunk of that tree, which looks pretty similar to the UBC tree. Here is a cutting from the row of trees on Marinaside, the ones in question. These are quite a bit larger than the first tree posted, and somewhat longer but narrower than on the UBC tree. Colour on the leaf backs is about the same. The Marinaside petioles are the only ones that are noticeably red, and they seemed longer and thicker than the others. The third photo is the trunk of the Marinaside tree, the one in question. It's quite different, but I don't know if that's just because it's young. This photo shows the two cuttings with the N. sylvatica, the Marinaside one on the right.
Re: Please ID this tree (Nyssa sylvatica) So it looks like we've confirmed that the only N. sinensis contained within this set is the one at UBC.
Re: Please ID this tree (Nyssa sylvatica) Thanks, Ron. It's interesting to know how much variation isn't too much to be considered the same thing.
Re: Please ID this tree (Nyssa sylvatica) Just because I like collecting flowers and fruits in the same thread, here is a photo of the fruits of the Nyssa sylvatica at UBCBG, on September 7, 2012..
As long as we're doing Nyssa, here's another one: Nyssa ogeche, in the Carolinian Garden at UBCBG. The only fruits I saw were single and are a lot larger (2cm long) than on the N. sylvatica. [Edited Sept 30, 2012: I've just added another fruit photo, taken Sept 27. It might even be the very same fruit, but it gives a better idea of the shape.
Back to the Marinaside Nyssa, these fruits are quite a bit larger than the ones on the UBCBG Nyssa sylvatica, shown in posting #20, but I've seen the fruit size given as 2/3", which would be about the 1.5cm shown here. I didn't measure the Nyssa ogeche fruit (previous posting), but it seemed larger than this and a different shape. There's one tree in the group with leaves about half the size of the others, and the bark is different also. Just a different clone? I don't think I found fruits on it.
I've measured the Nyssa ogeche fruit now - it's 3cm long, twice the length of the fruits on the Marinaside trees. We're hoping this one fruit stays on the tree till we can see what colour it gets.
Just to complete the picture, the UBC Nyssa sinensis has one fruit this year. Maybe it even has two, but we only found one. It's about the half-inch in length that it's supposed to be.
