“It’s in the sycamore, halfway up the trunk, to the right, near the gap in branches of the box elder in front of the sycamore!”
“The nest is in a cavity, 1 m up the cottonwood snag, facing North.”
“Hackberries and oaks are great places to find warbler flocks during fall migration.”
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I do not believe myself wholly “Tree Blind,” as Gabriel Popkin might say, but that does not by any means imply that I look at trees simply because they are trees and are beautiful, complex specimens in nature. I see trees in context of birds and not for themselves, which I suppose is a form of tree-blindness. As long as I could point out the general type of tree—enough for the nest card or to guide a fellow birder to the bird I was looking at—I was happy. A tree is just a living block of wood all the way up until a bird sits on a branch or plucks a caterpillar from beneath a leaf.
Even now, I just excitedly walked through the woods bordering a pond by my house, I was noting trees and wondering which birds used them and how. A Carolina Chickadee looked down, disappointed in me. To him, I certainly looked like a terrible case of tree blindness. Just because I know more than the average citizen about trees, which is nowhere near an adequate amount of knowledge, didn’t mean that they stood out to me in any way. I saw the chickadee in the hackberry, rather than the hackberry with a chickadee in its branches, if you follow my meaning. Perhaps it may be useful to remedy my own little strain of the disease Popkin calls tree blindness. Perhaps seeing trees and forests as themselves, rather than cogs in the lives of my avian friends, will broaden my understanding of ecology and diversify my interests.
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COMMON HACKBERRY
Celtis occidentalis
As stated in the Peterson Field Guide, hackberries have a very distinctive bark pattern, with peculiar lumps and ridges standing out on the bark (Petrides, 1972). The Hackberry Emperor is one species of butterfly that uses this tree as its host, according to Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2).
In addition to being useful for butterflies, this species of tree is a gold mine for migrating warblers. Its boughs often fill with Bay-breasted, Chestnut-sided, Magnolia, and Black-throated Green Warblers, among others. Their berries offer much-needed nutrition and energy to fuel their journeys. Just two Fridays ago, I was walking along the Olentangy Trail with some friends and I learned about the nipplewort galls found on hackberries. I must admit that I find the name tasteless, though it is quite interesting just how many leaves have at least one of these galls! They seem to be everywhere.
AMERICAN SYCAMORE
Platanus occidentalis
The sycamore is the tree that I am fastest to recognize in the field. Its lowland habitat, which is often near water, makes easy to scan for along a river bank. I was unsurprised to learn that this tree’s trunk diameter can grow wider than any other US native Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2)! However, despite the recognition of size being expected, I had no idea that these trees were used for the Native American dugout canoes, one of which measured 65 feet long and weighed approximately 9000 pounds (Petrides, 1972). These figures certainly made me stop to consider just how tall these beautiful trees can get.
Their distinctive bark has an artistic appeal to it and if there is ever a single tree that I shall grow to love as I do birds, it shall be the American Sycamore. While knowing the average measurements for the species is cool, there is nothing that strikes awe into my heart like skimming beneath a sycamore arching over the river in my kayak. This tree is particularly known for being the Yellow-throated Warbler’s preferred tree. In the spring, it is difficult to find a sycamore to pass by that lacks one singing at the top of its little lungs.
EASTERN BLACK WALNUT
Juglans nigra
Alongside Butternut, the Black Walnut is the only plant “with compound leaves that have chambered piths” (Petrides, 1972). While I could not reach a branch to photograph the pith, the long, recognizable leaves allowed me to identify the plant in an instant. Their hard nuts are perfect for playing catch or lobbing into the water to make an impressive splash. As fun and as attractive as I find this tree, I never would have guessed that people have stolen these trees or that they are prized (second to Pecan) for their wood and dye provided by the nuts Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2). One day, I truly hope to try making the dye and using it. I have heard quite a bit about it and have always thought testing it out would be a fun activity for some fall day.
SHAGBARK HICKORY
Carya ovata
When I first moved into my current home and went into the woods, this was one of the first trees that caught my interest. Its bark seeming to be all but sloughing off, and its impressively sized leaves all made it a wonderful tree to play pretend beneath. This was the first hickory I had ever seen and, while I thought the leaflets impressive enough, apparently, it has the fewest leaflets of the family (Petrides, 1972). It certainly makes up for it in its unique bark, though! I regarded the nuts with some curious caution, due to my mother’s rule against trying to eat any of the fruits we might find beneath it, and used them primarily for skimming across the ice during the winter to make a lovely sound or tossing some at siblings in a mock-battle. After reading about them on Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2), however, I am more interested in making corn cakes with their “milk” that can be obtained by pounding the nuts into pulp. Foraging, if it hasn’t been made obvious already, is something I enjoy the thought of. During highschool, I loved to read about all the plants that could support me in the wild when (not if) I became lost (on purpose, of course, never to be found again). Because of this, any sort of nut-bearing tree was very interesting.
BOXELDER MAPLE
Acer negundo
During my field work this past summer, I finally saw my first Boxelder, or Ash-leaf Maple. Before this summer, I knew the Boxelder tree only as the namesake for the Boxelder Beetle, which were all over my home in Minnesota. I knew they were named after a tree, but I was in my entomology phase, and I am ashamed there was never a time I was more tree blind than at that point. However, once the Prothonotary Warblers began nesting in cavities in Boxelder trees, I was quick to catch on. I remember them due to their trifoliate nature, which reminds me of Poison Ivy, but in tree form (Petrides, 1972). According to Native American Ethnobotany: A Database of Foods, Drugs, Dyes and Fibers of Native American Peoples, Derived from Plants., Native Americans would crystallize sugar out of the inner bark of these trees, which sounds like such an interesting process! Like most people, I know that Sugar Maples provide us with maple syrup when tapped and that sugar cane is where sugar comes from. However, I cannot say I ever would have guessed that the Boxelder tree produces any sort of sweetener, though I suppose it should not come as too much of a surprise, as trees in general convert sunlight and water into sugar.
BASKET OAK
Quercus michauxii Nutt
During my time as a volunteer with the Cincinnati Nature Center, I first learned how to identify a White Oak sp versus a Red Oak sp. White oak leaves looked like clouds, with rounded lobes, while red oak leaves were pointed (or bristle-tipped, as I now know) like fire. With deep ridges in the trunk, and some leaves more clearly lobed than not, I identified this tree as a Basket Oak after much deliberation. This was my hardest tree (Petride, 1972). Reportedly, the nuts of this tree can be eaten raw without boiling out the tanins, which I shall be testing later this fall once they drop, and, as could be inferred from the name, this tree was once used to make baskets when the wood was split (Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2)).
RED MULBERRY
Morus rubra
This tree has often baffled me, as the leaves have such variation! On the Lady Bird website, it states that the leaves range from “serrate and base rounded to … somewhat heart shaped” (Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2)). The leaves are so unique and this young one had very few lobes. The fruit, for me, is a bit too sweet for it to be one of my favourites, so the best part of this tree, in my opinion, is the soft underside compared with the rough topside of the leaves (Petrides, 1972). There used to be a larger mulberry tree in my woods, but it fell down several years ago. It was exciting to see one of its progeny!
BLACK WILLOW
Salix nigra
This willow tree popped up a short while ago and grew up like a weed! There used to be only one willow tree across the pond until this one sprouted right before the woods at my home. I always knew that willows readily bent and were really flexible, but I only recently learned that this willow in specific was special due to its ability to not split when a nail was driven through the wood (Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant Information Network (ACSA2).). The round bases were my primary tell for this tree, as it was not large enough for the size-indicator (Petrides, 1972). I love to see the caterpillars on this tree in specific!
Literature Cited:
Petrides, George A. 1972, Trees and Shrubs of Northeast and North Central US and Southeast and South Central Canada (Peterson Field Guide). Houghton Miflin, 428 pp.)