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| The California Buckeye. I took this picture yesterday, September 25, 2010. |
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| Right now the seed pods are not fully developed. As time goes they will swell and then split. |
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| I love how the Spanish Moss clings to some of the branches. |
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| California Buckeye (Aesculus Californica) in Marin County during December |
At the end of the summer the first sign of falls arrival becomes apparent. It is during deer season on my husbands family ranch, which is located in Marin County, where I see falls first effects. We usually take a little hike nearby the ranch deer camp around fall. It is nearby the camp where I find one of my favorite trees on the ranch. Its leaves turn before any other trees, after it has produced its cream colored flower spikes. This is usually beginning towards the end of summer, which is earlier than most trees. The leaves turn yellow to crispy brown rather quickly. They fool the unaware into thinking they are dying trees, since usually no other surrounding shrubs or trees leaves are changing. My favorite aspect of this tree is the branch structure and the large seeds that hang from its bare branches. They dangle like harvest ornaments.These seeds give the tree its common name, California Buckeye (Aesculus californica), since the fuzzy brown seed coat splits revealing a shiny tan seed, kind of looking like a bucks eye. As time goes, the slightly larger than a golf ball sized seeds fall to the ground. Since they are poisonous, most animals leave them alone, except squirrels. The California Buckeye is very toxic, even its flowers are toxic to honey bees. Although the tree is poisonous Native American tribes did eat the seeds by mashing the seed pulp and leaching out the toxins. The toxins were used for fishing, in which the natives would put toxins in the water, causing the fish to become stupified. The next time you are out and about the countyside take a look at the trees and see if you can find the California Buckeye. In the next week here I will try to post a current picture of this tree, so be sure to check back for an update on this post.
I have always liked the almost perfect symmetric shape of the tree. It is like the idyllic tree that we all draw in school as kids, just this one is trimmed by the wildlife on the bottom.
ReplyDeleteIt is great to see that you have written about a tree that I always found beautiful as I grew up. It is amazing to think it stood out in my mind as it did to Joe. It was always our perfect example of the buckeye tree to anyone that had never seen where the polished buckeyes came from.
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