Posted by
sallyg (central Maryland - Zone 7b) on Sep 14, 2019 4:20 PM concerning plant:
American Sycamore is a common tree along many highways in Maryland, and found in many parks near rivers.One beautiful specimen is the Witness Tree at Antietem National Battlefield. One can stand in utter peace on the stone bridge over a beautiful clear stream, near the massive tree, and reflect on the history of the site.
It is a messy tree, not a good choice for all yards, as it drops bark and twigs and has large leaves. Despite the mess, I have two sycamores in my yard and love them for their nature value and unique character.
Posted by
gingin (Fountain, Florida - Zone 8b) on Apr 3, 2019 8:39 AM concerning plant:
When Hurricane Michael hit here in the Florida panhandle I was really scared that my huge sycamore would fall and destroy my house. It lost lots of large branches but the tree still stands straight and tall much to my joy!
Posted by
Marilyn (Kentucky - Zone 6a) on Feb 6, 2012 11:31 PM concerning plant:
When I was growing up in Centerville, OH (a southern suburb of Dayton, OH), my parents planted an American Sycamore on their quarter-acre lot, as well as other types of trees. My dad planted it within a year of building the house and they had the house for 16 years. As the years went by, that tree shaded the whole house in the summer so well that the AC didn't have to be used.
Then, when they moved to Lebanon, OH, and built another house, they already had American Sycamores growing on their 5-acre property.
I always loved seeing those beautiful trees! To this day, whenever I see an American Sycamore, I remember the wonderful trees growing in the Centerville and the Lebanon yards!
DH and I don't have a large enough yard to grow this wonderful tree, but if we did, we'd grow it!
Love the peelings on the bark and the distinctive white bark color underneath the peelings!
Posted by
Mindy03 (Delta KY) on Mar 25, 2012 3:55 PM concerning plant:
Honey bees get light olive pollen and honeydew from this plant.
Posted by
ILPARW (southeast Pennsylvania - Zone 6b) on Aug 11, 2018 6:43 PM concerning plant:
The American Sycamore is a common tree in much of its native range from southern New England down to the Florida border into much of east Texas up to most of Iowa and Illinois to southern Michigan to the southeast tip of Ontario. growing mostly in rich bottomlands and along watercourses. It is fast growing of 2.5 to 3.5 feet/year and often lives over 350 years. Its leaves are 4 to 8 inches wide and have 3 to 5 shallow lobes. The buttonball dry fruits hang singly on the twigs. Sycamore is messy by dropping lots of twigs, pieces of bark, the buttonball fruits, and large leaves, but it is basically wind-firm. It has a shallow, fibrous root system and is easy to transplant. It does get picked on badly many years, when it is a cool, wet spring, by leaf anthracnose, a fungi disease, that causes most of the young leaves to darken and die, but a second crop comes forth. This causes some witches-brooming of twigs. It is a host plant to about 45 species of beneficial caterpillar species, and it does get picked on by other insects that are not so beneficial as sycamore lacebug, aphids, and spider mites. This is a fine, beautiful tree for large areas, not for small yards. On the grounds of the Brandywine Battlefield Park in Chadds Ford, PA, near the Gideon Gilpin farmhouse, there is a huge specimen with a plaque saying that the tree was alive when the Constitution was ratified in 1787.