Old Lion in Midtown

This tree lives on North Bellevue one block north of Poplar Ave. We drove past it in the way to pick up an old Sun Records sign for an auction. The afternoon sun around 3PM lit the trunk in a most spectacular way, highlighting the bark and the furrows. The tree must have been planted a long time ago, possibly when the house was new. In 1994 there was a severe ice storm. Most of Memphis was without power due to fallen limb breaking power lines. As a result many trees were trimmed back to get them away from the power lines. It looks like that happened here, making the tree unbalanced.

A grizzled old tree as yet not identified. Nov. 26 2017

Closer view of the trunk

Texture of the trunk has many ridges

A leaf from the tree. It is late fall so this is fading now.

Osage orange

tree #112 Osage orange (Maclura pomifera)

The Memphis community of Orange Mound derived its name from Osage orange hedges that were planted around a plantation to keep cattle and pigs from straying. Osage oranges have large spines and form a dense impenetrable hedge when planted together. I had tried looking for these trees in Orange Mound, but they are dirty trees dropping grapefruit sized fruit (sometimes called horse apples). The need to clean up after these fruits has probably doomed the Osage orange from being a yard tree. 

In a lunchtime conversation with my friend Ken Nishimoto, avid fisherman, he mentioned Osage oranges were in Shelby Farms. I set out to find them with my son Adam. We took Missy his one year old black dog on a romp in the park mostly off leash. Missy ran and changed directions like a purple martin diving for mosquitoes. The shear joy of being able to run as fast as possible in an open grassy field is the signature of youth and life bubbling over. Fortunately for Adam she always returned and did not disappear over a hill. 

Adam with Missy as a pup, about 40 pounds now

We parked at a picnic area on the road going through the Starry Nights exhibit, a drive through lit up path with animated light displays with a Christmas theme. After finding a path in the woods we walked along looking for the elusive Osage orange. We met many others some with dogs and some with children who wanted to know if Missy was friendly. Some were curious what we were looking for since it appeared we were looking for something. We showed one couple a seed pod from a honey locust. This got their little girl interested and she went off to find more seed pods. To see the entry on black locust (tree #69) go here.

Honey locust seed pod (a legume tree)

 The forest was not a good place to look. After emerging near a playground we turned east, passed a zip line with about 20 people getting their harnesses off after skimming over a small lake and moved onto a trail next to a pond. A short way down this track we found a very spiky tree. Actually it was a dead branch from another tree that was stuck in a tree without spines. A little searching discovered the source. It is winter and there are no leaves or fruit, but we are guessing this is an Osage orange based on the spines. There were several of these trees close together and of different sizes. The spines could come right out from the trunk.

The right trunk has a cluster of large spines coming out from the trunk.

These pictures give the size of the spines. It would not be possible to pass through a fence of these shrubs. Some of the trees get quite large. These would no longer pose a barrier as the lower parts are open.

 

Adam looking for some leftover fruit Nov. 24, 2017 Shelby Farms

I will return to these trees next summer to capture the leaves and fruit and to show that we did find the real Osage orange trees in the winter at Shelby Farms.

Pawpaw

Tree #111 Pawpaw (Asimina triloba)

Walking on the  Old Forest Trail at Overton Park we immediately ran into a small grove of pawpaws. These were in fruit and one of the fallen fruits was bright yellow inside, being very ripe. 

Yellow fruit very soft and creamy looking.

Pawpaw fruit Sept. 9, 2017

These are not large trees, only a few inches in the trunk.  The leaves are large in a hand-like arrangement at the branch ends. The grove is on the trail just west of the parking lot at the bike arch entrance to the park (at Sam Cooper and East Parkway). We parked behind the gazebo and headed south on the trail.

My friend Ken likes to try unusual fruit and he has asked me if I knew where there was a pawpaw. The fruits are edible and taste like custard. I will bring him some for lunch Monday. I had been hoping to re-find another plant I had seen on an earlier walk in the Old Forest, a trifoliate orange with about two inch spines. I did not see it this trip. 

We met a couple of students taking Duane McKenna's entomology class at U of M. They had come to the park to hunt insects with a butterfly net.  We thought of them later when Susan spotted a bright red and black insect that I thought was a beetle, but trying to ID it, it seems like it might be a red velvet ant (Dasymutilla aureola pacifica) actually a wasp. see this link

A fast moving red velvet ant? running from the iPhone Sept. 9, 2017

This tree reminds me of the Jungle Book song "The Bare Necessities". There is one verse about pawpaws:

Now when you pick a pawpaw
Or a prickly pear
And you prick a raw paw
Well next time beware
Don't pick the prickly pear by the paw
When you pick a pear
Try to use the claw
But you don't need to use the claw
When you pick a pear of the big pawpaw
Have I given you a clue?

This is not a prickly pear (I have a small one in my front yard) so it may be the "big pawpaw" mentioned. 

Tree #110 Mock orange (Philadelphus x virginalis)

My next door neighbor has a well-tended densely-planted front yard garden. His northeast anchor plant is a mock orange. The shrub is covered with white flowers in April.

A wide shot showing some early lilies in front (April 14, 2017)

Some closer views of the flowers

These four petal white flowers remind me of childhood memories of dwarf dogwood flowers in Alaska (not related). The dwarf dogwood are ground cover plants just inches tall.

I went back to this plant in June to get a summer image. 

June 17 2017 view of the same mock orange. Now the lilies are in bloom

The flowering tree on the left edge was the subject of another post on Bottlebrush buckeye. The hedge next to the mock orange actually belongs to the next yard. This hedge was just trimmed last week by a man with a drenched shirt quite early in the morning. hard work.

As I was going through some old emails I found two more pictures of the mock orange from 2016, but the date is not known. 

The flowers blooming now are iris (sometime before the lilies)

A stunning flower-laden view

 

The Vitex saga

In a previous post I featured the vitex. When we moved into our new home in midtown we wanted to plant a vitex, but there was no room in our yard because of the pecan. In the street in front of our house we have a median strip about two feet wide, so we thought we could plant there. Our neighbor is the horticulturalist for the city and she said we could plant the tree in the median if we took care of it. 

You can see the median in this link for Chinese pistache. We went forward and bought a small vitex near Halloween 2016. I know this because a neighbor had a Halloween party where we invited some of the guests to come visit the newly planted tree and pour a libation of Jamaican rum on the tree in celebration. The rum story came from a cruise with a side trip to a Jamaican plantation. Our guide told us that the native people would offer a gift to a large tree when it was cut down. A sort of libation of rum to the tree god. We and a few friends made the libation taking a few sips for ourselves. The vitex prospered. 

Seven months later (mid June 2017) the new tree was well established and sending up pale green flowers. I was anticipating the purple blooms, while watering the small shrub with a water can. The vitex was protected by three iron stakes about four feet high to keep mowers from buzzing it. Certainly the three poles would ward off weed eaters used by the Blight Patrol to clean up the median after the daffodils were finished. I underestimated the vigilance of the Blight Patrol. They destroyed the vitex down to the roots. 

The withered devastated vitex inbetween the protective poles. June 12, 2017

 

The greenish flowers are leaning over the pole and the leaves are still green. RIP

The view was infuriating. What person could not tell this was a protected plant and not a weed? Seven months growth wiped out by a zealous weed-eating Blight Patroller. The bare trunk had been so whipped by the weed eater there was no bark left on it. It was not going to grow back. 

The only thing to do was to get another vitex. The first one was from Midtown Nursery at Madison and McClean.  I went back and they had one left. It was a little yellow. The owner said it was root bound, too long in the pot. In fact, this was probably the sister to the vitex I got at Halloween last year. I planted it in the same spot. The old trunk was actually very hard to pull out of the ground. It was very firmly rooted in the ground. This time I placed some hardware cloth around the base to keep any weed eaters away. 

Vitex II. The vitex is dead. Long live the vitex. June 17, 2017

This plant has one purple flower spike in the center. I called over my horticulturalist neighbor and her husband. We poured a little Jamaican rum on the new vitex and had a sip for ourselves. Next year we will see if the hardware cloth keeps it safe from the Blight Patrol. The roots should now spread out and the leaves should get their healthy green sheen back.