Spindle
Euonymus europaeus
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By the small pond at the Reserve entrance there is a spindle tree. During summer it is rather insignificant in appearance, with small greenish white flowers, but come the autumn it takes on superb colouring, crowned with beautiful fuchsia coloured fruit that really are spectacular on the bare branches following leaf fall. The seeds are orange in colour.
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Spindle berries |
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London Plane One of Warnham’s most handsome trees, a London Plane, is right in the middle of the car park as you enter the Reserve. It has a beautiful winter silhouette, with a tall trunk and a mass of graceful, descending branches. It looks particularly beautiful at sunset. The London Plane is a hybrid between the Eastern Plane, Platanus orientalis, which is a native of Turkey and Greece and the Western Plane, Platanus occidentalis, which the Americans call Buttonwood or Sycamore. The London Plane is very tolerant of atmospheric pollution and root compaction and is therefore a popular urban tree, planted in city streets and parks throughout .the world. In fact, in spite of its name, its leaf is a symbol of New York City Department of Parks and Recreation and is prominently displayed on signs and buildings in public places. Ironically, it is now on their restricted list for planting and this may be due to two of its disadvantages for urban planting: its leaves are large and rot slowly, so they are difficult to dispose of, and the hairs which are shed off the young leaves in spring can be an irritant to people with breathing problems.
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A feature of this large tree is its distinctive bark which looks like pieces of jigsaw puzzle. The dark, outer bark flakes off to reveal the smooth, pale bark underneath
In summer maple-like leaves are produced and male and female flowers are borne on separate stems. The fruit forms a seed ball, a dense cluster of achenes together with numerous stiff hairs which aid wind dispersal. These pendulous fruits hang from the tree for much of the winter, giving the tree its distinctive look. They are a source of food for some finches. As you walk round the Reserve you may notice that there are further good specimens of this tree on the adjoining golf course.
- From an article in The Reedbed by Tricia Hall |
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Silver Birch
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Birch seeds The silver birch is one of our most graceful trees possessing a silver-white bark that gives it its name. In spring it flowers in wind polinated catkins before the leaves are produced in early spring. The seeds are from catkins in late summer and are small and wind-born by means of small wings |
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Larch Trees in afternoon sunlight The larch is unusual in that it is a deciduous conifer. These pictures by Vivien Hodge show the wonderful autumn colouring to great effect.
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Transverse section (TS) through larch leaf This is a stained section showing the structure of the leaf. Underlying the green stained outer cuticle is the palisade mesophyll (also green) where the chloroplasts are found in the living tree. These are responsible for using sunlight to generate energy and drive the tree's metabolism. The brown structures are water carrying tissue. Also to be seen are small dark crystal clusters or druses in the spongy layer beneath the palisade mesophyll. |
TS of larch leaf showing crystal rosettes (druses) These are crystals of oxalic acid, the same chemical that renders rhubarb leaves poisonous, and many plants use the poison properties of oxalates to protect themselves from being eaten by insects. Larches high in oxalate druses have been found to suffer less beetle damage than those with few druses. |
In spring, some of the most noticeable flowering trees and bushes are those of blackthorn (sloe) and hawthorn. These produce distinctive fruits in autumn. |
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Blackthorn Blackthorn is distinguished by its flowers being on bare branches
Sloes are the fruit of blackthorn Sloes are incredibly astringent in taste when fresh, but can be marinaded in gin with sugar to make sloe gin |
Hawthorn flowers are to found amongst the characteristically shaped leaves:
Hawthorn
Haws are the fruit of the hawthorn Haws are important food for birds over winter |
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