Many thanks to Jeff Ollerton and HB for giving me the identity of this tree.
It just so happened that at the same time I was trying to identify the tree, we walked by Barbara’s house. She grows many bonsai trees. “Clearly it’s a River Birch,” she says, “compare it to my little River Birch on the left.”
This leaf shows a wedge-shaped base typical of the River Birch.
The weird thing about the leaf is that there are two different shapes. This one shows a more squarish base. That really threw me when trying to identify the type of tree. Both leaves are from the same tree. Does the age of the leaf determine the shape?
May 13, 2015…Looking at a bunch of leaves together, we can see various wedge shaped bases…some more acute than others.
May 13, 2015…Looking upward into the umbrella, you can see the white bark limbs…
…but looking at the trunk, you’ll see cinnamon colored bark.
According to Wikipedia, “Betula nigra (black birch, river birch, water birch) is a species of birch native to the Eastern United States from New Hampshire west to southern Minnesota, and south to northern Florida and west to Texas.”
It grows in the East, not the West. I guess the jury is still out on the type of birch it is.
5-13-15…Big news today: A ginormous swarm is moving INTO my Grand Kids Log hive today! Detailed post to follow.
Adventures in Natural Beekeeping 