American plane tree
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American plane tree ( Platanus occidentalis ) |
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The American sycamore or Western plane tree ( Platanus occidentalis ) is a tree art from the family of platanaceae (Platanaceae). The species is native to eastern North America and can reach heights of up to 50 meters.
description
The American plane tree is a deciduous tree that can grow to heights of 35, sometimes over 50 meters. Trunk diameters of over 4 meters are possible. The bark is scaly and gray-brown-whitish.
The stipules are whole to roughly toothed. The leaves are light green and vine-like, up to 22 centimeters long and up to 25 centimeters wide; on water shoots they can also be up to 30 × 40 centimeters in size. They are usually 3 to 5-lobed, sometimes up to 7-lobed, rarely also unlobed. The individual lobes of the leaf blade are also predominantly wider than long; the basal lobes are usually smaller and often strongly bent back. The terminal lobes (sitting at the end of the leaf) are half to two thirds as long as the entire leaf blade. The leaf margins are completely to roughly serrated. Some of the teeth are briefly awned, the end of the lobe usually pointed. The leaves are predominantly hairless, only on the underside of the leaf along the leaf veins there is partial hairiness.
The flowering time is in spring. The female inflorescences have a diameter of 25-30 millimeters; the inflorescence axis is up to 15 centimeters long. The fruits ripen in late autumn.
The chromosome number is 2n = 42.
Occurrence
The American plane tree is native to eastern North America . It prefers fertile, moist locations. The tree can often be found on alluvial soils near bodies of water; it also occurs on plateaus and limestone soils. They are found at altitudes from 0 to 950 m. The distribution area extends from southern Ontario across about the eastern third of the USA to the Mexican states of Coahuila , Nuevo León , San Luis Potosí and Tamaulipas . The American plane tree is a character species of the alluvial forests of the order Ulmo-Aceretalia saccharini in eastern North America.
Today the tree can also be found planted in gardens and parks and as a street tree .
use
Native Indians used the American plane tree for various medicinal purposes. Areas of application were the treatment of colds and coughs, the tree was also used for remedies against skin, respiratory, digestive and gynecological problems.
Systematics
The nominate form is one of the largest deciduous tree species in North America, with heights of over 50 meters and trunk diameters of over 4 meters. Small trees with slightly different foliage (leaf blades wider than long, lobes almost completely separated from one another) are considered to be the variety Platanus occidentalis var. Glabrata (Fernald) Sargent ; the distribution area of this variety lies to the west, for example from Iowa to Mexico and overlaps with that of the species Platanus rzedowskii Nixon & Peale in Tamaulipas .
In large parts of the range of the species there are occasionally specimens whose leaf blades are deeply lobed, with a long wedge-shaped tapering leaf base, have been described as the variety Platanus occidentalis var. Attenuata Sargent .
Similar species
The maple-leaved plane tree ( Platanus × hispanica ) is a hybrid of Platanus occidentalis and the oriental plane tree ( Platanus orientalis ). It has leaves whose lobes are often longer than wide; the bark is greener than that of the American plane tree.
swell
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Erich Oberdorfer : Plant-sociological excursion flora for Germany and neighboring areas . With the collaboration of Angelika Schwabe and Theo Müller. 8th, heavily revised and expanded edition. Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart (Hohenheim) 2001, ISBN 3-8001-3131-5 , pp. 423 .
- ^ DE Moerman 1986, quoted in Flora of North America.
