HORSE CHESTNUT?
Stonington, CT - While I was in Stonington I saw this tree which I thought might be a Chestnut. It looked in bad shape, the leaves were starting to wilt and the nuts look like they had seen better days. When I got home and did some research I noticed that the leaves did not match. The closest thing I could find was Horse Chestnut but I think that only grows in Europe. Can someone identify this tree? Anyone...anyone?
Closeup of leaves and nuts.
Labels: Stonington CT, trees
posted by Bill @ 9:00 PM
3 Comments:
Hi Bill. Tom thinks this is the Common Horsechestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum). Michael Dirr's "Manual of Woody Landscape Plants" says -- LANDSCAPE VALUE: Park, arboretum, campus, commercial grounds, golf courses and other large areas -- not for small residential properties; abundant through the eastern states, virtually every campus has a horsechestnut; the blotch and mildew limit extensive use; widely used in Europe; gardens such as Versailles, Schwetzingen and many English parks are well endowed with this species...on our European garden tours this tree, especially in flower, elicits more responses than any other. Zones 4-7.
There are lots of Horsechestnut trees here in british Columbia, they are also in England where as kids we used to get the nut, drill a hole and thread a string through and play "conkers" . in this game the challenge is to smash the other boys conker with yours.
As a child in the 60s/70s I remember there were horse chestnut trees in New Jersey and RI. The New England nut had a different covering -- less spiny than the NJ variety. In RI we played "kinger" which sounds a lot like "conkers."
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