Yellow Birch

Yellow Birch (Betula alleghaniensis) grows throughout the northeastern US and Canada and the Appalachians. I think of it as a swamp tree but apparently it grows best in well-drained loam.  It is a common tree in Michigan wetlands since it can tolerate wet soil much better than most competing trees.

Yellow Birch is a food source for a number of animals, including deer, moose, snowshoe hare, ruffed grouse, and red squirrels.  A broken twig has a pleasant sweet smell, like root beer.  Some people drink tea from the twigs and bark.  According to the USDA, its wood is used for furniture, cabinetry, and veneer or it can be processed for charcoal or wood alcohol [pdf].

While it doesn't have the striking white bark of the Paper Birch, the Yellow Birch's silver bark is distinctive with peels of paper-thin strips.

Bur Oak

The Burr Oak (Quercus macrocarpa) is a tree of the open grassland. They're native to the Great Plains and prairies and are a characteristic species of the oak savanna. They evolved to survive the frequent grassfires of these ecosystem, with thick corky bark that provides fire resistance.

Affordances

When I was younger, graffiti carved into trees enraged me. I couldn't understand why people would deface nature like that, particularly in parks and nature preserves. Years later, I was surprised to find an explanation in a book on design. Donald Norman, a psychologist and design expert, wrote:

"Affordances
'In one case, the reinforced glass used to panel shelters (for railroad passengers) erected by the British Rail was smashed by vandals as fast as it was renewed. When the reinforced glass was replaced by plywood boarding, however, little further damage occurred, although no extra force would have been required to produce it. Thus British Rail mangaged to elevate the desire for defacement to those who could write, albeit in somewhat limited terms. Nobody has, as yet, considered whether there is some kind of psychology of materials. But on the evidence, there could well be!'

"There already exists the start of a psychology of materials and of things, the study of affordances of objects. When used in this sense, affordance refers to the perceived and actual properties of the thing, primarily those fundamental properties that determine just how the thing could possibly be used. A chair affords ('is for') support and, therefore, affords sitting. A chair can also be carried. Glass is for seeing through, and for breaking. Wood is normally used for solidity, opacity, support, or carving. Flat, porous, smooth surfaces are for writing on. So wood is also for writing on. Hence the problem for British Rail: when the shelters had glass, vandals smashed it; when they had plywood, vandals wrote on and carved it. The planners were trapped by the affordances of their materials."

Similarly the beech tree is trapped by the affordances of its smooth, pale bark.
While initials carved into century-old beeches still make me unhappy, at least I understand it somewhat.

quote from Design of Everyday Things (page 9) by Donald Norman.

Tulip time

While the colorful tulips of Spring lost their petals weeks ago, the tulip poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera) is blooming now. This tree isn't really a poplar; it's a member of the magnolia family. Southern Michigan is at the northern edge of this tree's distribution. Michigan's state champion tulip poplar is located in nearby Cass County's Russ Forest Park.

Syrup Season

Late winter, when the sap begins to flow, means maple syrup is coming soon. It takes 40 gallons of maple sap to make a gallon of sweet syrup. Several places near Kalamazoo offer demonstrations of the process and celebrations of the season.

Kalamazoo Nature Center Maple Sugar Festival 2010

Kellogg Forest Maple Sugar Day

Blandford Nature Center Sugarbush Festival & Pancake Breakfast

Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore Maple Sugar Time

St Joseph County Parks, IN Sugar Camp Days

Vermontville Maple Syrup Festival

Or read the Michigan Backyard Gardener on making your own syrup.

Last to fall?

The American Beech (Fagus grandifolia ) is one of the few deciduous trees in Michigan to hold its leaves all winter. The leaves change color in autumn but rather than dropping they just slowly fade to tan on the branches. I'd never really thought about when they finally lose their leaves, but this week I noticed scattered beech leaves on top of the snow.

Hints of Spring

Looking outside, Kalamazoo is in the middle of winter. Icicles hang from the eaves and snow blankets the ground. Plowed snowbanks are still shoulder-high. But, there are some clues that Winter is ending: longer days, milder temperatures, and more sun.

Buckets on maple trees are the truest sign of Spring. The buckets collect sap used to produce maple syrup. Warm afternoons and below-freezing nights cause sap to flow, so even though it feels like winter the trees are awakening.

Fall color

Many local trees have lost their leaves already but a few still show spectacular color, like this maple in Kalamazoo's Bronson Park.

The Botany Photo of the Day has an interesting post on how sunlight affects color development in individual leaves.

Dogwood

The Flowering Dogwood, Cornus florida, is one of Michigan's showiest native trees. The flowers are about the same size as trillium flowers and their blooming season overlaps. Because of its beauty and reasonable size, this native has become a popular garden tree.

Race for light

The trees are starting to leaf-out which means the early wildflower season in Kalamazoo is coming to an end. Many of the plants that were in bloom two weeks ago have finished for the year and their leaves are already fading. The trillium, phlox, anemone, and blue-eyed Mary are in full flower now, but soon the floor of the woods will be in daylong shade.

In the few weeks after winter's last killing frost and before the tree leaves form a solid canopy, ephemeral wildflowers need to sprout, bloom, get pollinated, and set seed. It's a short season, but beautiful.

Not so evergreen

Most conifers in Michigan are green year round. The Tamarack (Larix laricina) is the only one that loses its needles for winter. The brown needles remind me of an artificial tree I almost bought by mistake in Uruguay.

Kalamazoo is at the southern edge of this tree's range which extends to northern Canada. Historically, tamarack has been used for many purposes from ships to paper to decoys.

Peak color

Maples are the star of Michigan's fall color season and they are brilliant now. Unseasonably warm weather made it really pleasant for a walk through the woods.

Sumac

Sumacs are consistently one of the earliest and most colorful trees of autumn. They don't form dense forests and never grow very tall, so they add bright accents to the landscape.

Changes

Over the last few days, more color is appearing in the woods. These silver maples near the Kalamazoo River were almost red while most of the trees were still green. The boardwalk is part of the Kalamazoo Nature Center's trail system.

Redbud

Redbud is one of the most interesting local flowering trees. The flowers appear in clusters on the bare branches before the leaves open.