Salix caroliniana, commonly known as Coastal Plain Willow is native to the southeastern USA, Mexico, Caribbean Islands and the parts of Central America.
It is a shrub or small tree. It’s generally grows in wet areas and along ponds and lakes edges. Typically it grows 5 – 9 m (16 – 30 f) in height, in Florida occasionally it can be grow higher. Often as broad as tall or broader. The shape of the tree is irregular crown. The trunk is short, and often leaning. The bark color is gray, roughened with ridges and furrows. The smooth bark is not particularly outstanding. It is described by Argus as "having branches dark to light brown, glabrous or sparsely pubescent (coated with soft hairs); branchlets reddish brown to yellowish brown, brittle at branch base, with bud scale margins free and overlapping.
S. caroliniana is a deciduous tree. The leaves are temperate, light green in color. These are long and narrow, about 20 cm (8 in) long and 2 - 5 cm (1 - 2 in) broad. There have little grooves both edges of the leaves.
The flowers of Coastal Plain Willow are White in color are appeared in the early spring, either before or together with the emergence of leaves. The spear shaped capsule are green in color. When it becomes mature and buster numbers of seeds comes out. Every seeds contain white cotton to wind dispersed seeds
Acer rubrum commonly known
as Red Maple also known as swamp Maple or Soft Maple is native to Eastern and
Central North America. Red maple is one of the best named of all trees. It is
generally easy to identify for its highly changeable in morphological
characteristics.
Red Maple is a medium to
large growing tree is growing 18 – 27 m (60 – 90 ft) in height, but
exceptionally grows over 35 m (116 ft) in height. It is spread is about 12 m
(40 ft) with a rounded to oval crown. The trunk diameter can range 46-76 cm
(18-30 in), depending on the growing conditions. It is a slow growing tree,
within 10 years it may grow about 6 m (20 ft) tall. It grows faster than Norway
Maples and Sugar Maples, but slower than Silver Maple.
A. rubrum is a deciduous
tree. The leaves are green in color and turned into red in autumn but can also
become yellow or orange on some of leaves. They are typically 5 – 10 cm (2 – 4
in) long and same as wide, with 3 – 5 palmate lobes with a serrated margin. The
sinuses are typically narrow, but the leaves can display important variation.
The top side of the leaves are light green and the down side is whitish and can
be either sea-blue or hairy. The leaf stalks are up to 10 cm (4 in) long and
usually red in color.
The twigs are reddish in
color and partially shiny with small lenticels. Midget shoots are present on
many branches. The buds are normally blunt and greenish to reddish in color,
usually with several loose scales. The lateral buds are slightly stalked and in
addition there may be collateral buds present as well. The buds form in fall
and winter and are often visible from a distance due to their reddish tint.
The flowers of Red Maple are
appear in spring generally coming before the new leaves. The flowers usually
unisexual, with male and female flowers blooming in individual sessile
clusters, although sometimes they are also bisexual. The considered Polygamodioecious
by itself that meaning some flowers individuals are male, some are female, and
some flowers are monoecious. For the Climate condition, the Red Maple tree
sometimes can change from male to female or male to hermaphroditic, or
hermaphroditic to female. The tree usually start blooming when it grow about 8
years old but it significantly varies between tree to tree some trees star
blooming when 4 years old. The flowers are red in color, with 5 small petals
and 5 lobed calyx borne in hanging clusters, usually at the twig tips. They are
lineal to oblong in shape with pubescent. The feminine flowers have one pistil
formed from two fused carpels with a glabrous superior ovary and two long
styles that protrude beyond the calyx. The staminate flowers contain 4 – 12
stamens, sometime with 8.
Acer rubrum – Red Maple
The fruit is a samara 1.5 –
2.5 cm in long that grows in pairs with somewhat divergent wings at an angle of
50 to 60 degrees. They are borne on long
slender stems and are variable in color from light brown to reddish. They ripen
from April through early June, before even the leaf development is altogether
complete. After they reach maturity, the seeds are dispersed for a 1 to 2 week
period from April through July.
The bark of young trees is
smooth, silvery-gray becoming scaly and dark with age and older branches and
trunk are covered with scaly gray brown bark.
Red maple is a wonderful ornamental tree for its attractive foliage. It
is cultivate as ornamental tree in the urban road side and park.
