American Sweetgum

Family: Altingiaceae

Liquidambar styraciflua Sweetgum, Alligator wood

This trees is native to warm temperate areas of eastern North America and tropical montane regions of Mexico and Central America. Despite the similarity of its leaves to maple or oak it is in a completely different family. It always seems like this would have been a better common name for maple. The distinctive spiny fruit are shared across the genus, and Asian species in the same genus are used medicinally. The wood has been put to various uses, including imitation mahogany. It is a common ornamental, probably because of its fall colors. Those colors are much more vibrant the farther north you go.

In Florida sweetgum is found from Tampa northward and occurs in both lowland and upland woods.

Form: A large tree up to 40 m in height. Leaves: Alternate, simple 10-18 cm (sometimes more than 20 cm), star shaped with long petioles, serrated margins. The alternate leaves makes it easy to distinguish from maples. Flowers: March-May,when leaves are half grown greenish. Male and female flowers are born on the same tree. Male flowers are in terminal racemes two to three inches long, covered with rusty hairs; the female flowers are born on a slender peduncle borne in the axil some leaves. Fruit:Hard spiny balls 2.5-4cm in diameter hanging on long stalks are made up of fused ovaries, making it a compound fruit with 40-60 seed capsules. These fruit are persistent and quite distinctive for the species. Bark: Grayish, fissured and interlacing. The plated bark on small twigs gives it another common name: Alligator wood.





Leaves and fruit of sweetgum. Sweetgum bark. Sweetgum's super distinctive fruit.

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Sweetgum Map Florida State University Campus see in separate window

Pecan and Water Hickory

Walnut Family (Junglandaceae).
The Pecan Carya illinoinensis
Pecan is a native to North America but introduced (and now wild) in North Florida. It is a medium to large sized deciduous tree 100-140 feet tall. The leaves are alternate, pinnately compound, ten to twenty inches long, each with 9-17 leaflets that are 4-8 inches long. The flowers are unisexual, both sexes are borne in separate clusters on the same tree. The fruit are thin-shelled nuts; four winged from base to apex, borne in clusters of three to twelve. A ridge is formed where the two halves of the outer fruit come together. The fruit is dark brown in color and covered with yellow scales. The husk is thin and brittle. The husk often persists on the branch into the winter after dropping the nut. The nut is thin shelled with a reddish-brown color and pointed at both ends. The bark is grayish brown or light brown and is flat ridged and shallowly furrowed. This tree's distribution follows the river basins very closely, principally along the Mississippi and its tributaries, the Colorado River in Texas, and along some of its tributaries in Mexico. It appears that several hybrids are grown on campus. This tree is similar to other Hickories: It is distinguished from water Hickory Carya aquatica by having glabrous (i.e. hairless) leaf parts, and from black walnut (Juglans nigra) by its grayish bark (black walnut has dark furrowed bark).

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Pecan leaves

Pecan bark

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Walnut Family (Junglandaceae).
Water Hickory Carya aquatica
This 60-70 foot deciduous Florida native grows best in wet well-drained soils along stream banks and flood plains throughout the southeastern United States. It grows from eastern Carolinas, south to central Florida, and west to Eastern Texas. The alternately arranged pinnately compound leaves are 9 and 15 inches long. Each compound leaf has 7-17 lance-shaped leaflets with finely serrate margins that are 3 to 10 inches long. The topside of the leaflet is dark green and glossy, while the underside is a paler green with sparse pubescence (or hairs) present along the veins. Water hickory bark is gray or light brown with narrow cracks that give rise to reddish scales. When mature, the bark looks shaggy with flakey plates. Small greenish flowers bloom in the spring. Male and female flowers bloom on the same branch between April and May, with male flowers occurring in three-stemmed clusters called "catkins," while 2 to 10 female flowers appear on short stalks. The bitter nuts or pecans are enclosed in a dark brown, 1- to 1 ½-inch-long, thin-shelled husk, which splits along four winged seams to release the nut.

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Water hickory leaves and fruit
Water hickory bark

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Pecan and Hickory Map Florida State University Campus see in separate window