Tree skeletons

[Susan]

Hi,
I'm a teacher and I am in search of some information. My class is studying the evergreen tree, the mountain ash tree and the sycamore tree. Does anyone know if these three types of trees are considered conical, spreading or pyramidical?

Thanks!

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

Susan,

With evergreen the subject is too broad. If you were saying spruce then I would say pyramidal to columnar. There are many cultivars of species that have very different forms, even "tormented" or weeping.

Mt. ash or Sorbus is easier, they are usualy upright-spreading, which means they have a soreading tendancy with narrow branch unions. (some in the industry want us to get away fro the term "crotch" because it tends to get giggles or snickers from the sophmoric sections )
But then ther are columnar cultivars.

Sycamore or American planetree is the easiest, very few cvs. so we can say it is pyramidal when young with a rounded form as it ages.


If you want more info then you need here are some good sites.

http://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/index.html
http://www.hort.uconn.edu/plants/a/a.html
http://gardenbed.com/results.cfm
http://home.earthlink.net/~earlecj/index.htm