Tree/Shrub Leaf Identification Help

[Rich Riddle]

I have a couple of volunteer trees growing near the foundation of the house and am wondering if it's worth digging them up and transplanting them or simple cutting them down. I am thinking these are Silver Maple but am in no way an authority on identification. What do you think?

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Thanks for any input. I also have a few other volunteers around the property and will likely add this pictures later.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

It does not look like Silver Maple to me. Looks more like Rose of Sharon AKA Althea.

[Rich Riddle]

Not silver maple. Looks like Rose of Sharon.
Darn the luck. That would explain why they were planted near the foundation. The wife might not like them being cut down.....I am fairly certain the other ones are definitely Maple. The one looks like Japanese Maple, and the others will need to be posted.

[Doug Garson]

Last picture does resemble Rose of Sharon, maybe take a sample to a local nursery.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

I doubt those were planted by anyone other than Mother Nature. Around here if you do not mow, trim, cultivate, or (heaven forbid) spray. you will soon be in the brush, followed by the woods.

[Paul F Franklin]

Lots of decent tree/shrub identification apps for your phone:

https://brightly.eco/best-plant-identification-app/

Many of them have free versions. I've used "picture this" app a few times with reasonable success.

[John K Jordan]

I doubt those were planted by anyone other than Mother Nature. Around here if you do not mow, trim, cultivate, or (heaven forbid) spray. you will soon be in the brush, followed by the woods.

Around here you will soon be in the thicket of evil imported/invasive species like bush honeysuckle and privet. When we bought this property some of the wooded areas had growth so thick under the big trees you literally couldn’t fight your way through them with a machete. There was privet outside the 2nd story window on the house and so overgrown that on the first visit I didn’t know there was a barn 30’ from the driveway!

I’ve declared war on these and some other species (especially alanthus trees, hard to kill but I have a secret weapon) on our 27 acres. Cutting the various nasties down is almost a waste of time - they will just get mad and come back stronger than ever. Best to pull them up by the roots. The 1’ bucket on the excavator with a thumb is perfect, I can target individual plants and leave the desirables alone. In the last few years I’ve cleared out maybe 3-4 acres, bush honeysuckle maybe 15’ high and wide, some privet at least 25’ tall and so thick it was almost dusk underneath. (The biggest diameter privet “tree” I ever found was about 8”, big enough to cut some into woodturning blanks. Oddly, the wood looks very much like dogwood, small dark heartwood, creamy white sapwood, fine-grained and very hard and dense.)

Bush honeysuckle, btw, inhibits the growth of other plants around it. I had large areas taken over by the bushes with nearly bare dirt beneath and between them. Not even good for bird nesting. Sure smells great in the spring, though!

Another challenge is bittersweet vine choking out native trees. My local forester puts it near the top of the kill list.

Fortunately we have no kudzu.

JKJ

[Rich Riddle]

John,

In Kentucky we have an abundance of honeysuckle, an over-abundance. It plagues both the farm and the house (two separate properties). Luckily, we eradicated all the invasive bamboo at the farm. The old farmer had planted one stalk despite numerous people warning him. We had to take the top several inches off of over an acre of land to eradicate the bamboo. A neighbor with property took the soil and now has his own bamboo (but he likes it). The wife likes rose of Sharon, although I thought it was rows of Sharon. We returned home yesterday from Eastern Tennessee near Cherokee Lake and noticed a lot of kudzu. It looked terrible.

At the farm, we have some Maple volunteers and those are definitely Maples. Tomorrow the pictures of those trees will be loaded. We removed a large section of decorative grass and the flag pole about 50 feet in front of the farm house and are now considering trees to put in the area this fall. So far the list of possibilities include a tulip tree (Kentucky state tree), Red Maple, Red Oak, and Blazing Maple. All those trees are native to Kentucky. We are looking for fast growers, at least initially.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Jim Becker]

Rose of Sharon (a type of hibiscus I believe) is beautiful but extremely invasive because of self-seeding and high germination rates. If you don't get the volunteers pulled out when they are very young, they become hard to yank out and will grow back from being broken off in many cases. I've removed several here at our new property and will likely remove the remaining three if I cannot keep them under control.

[John K Jordan]

Tulip tree: Tulip Poplar (Yellow Poplar) or Tulip Magnolia? The latter makes good privacy screening. The Tulip poplar grows very fast - I let a sapling grow outside our garden and after not many years the trunk is 12” in diameter. It will come down. We have several tulip magnolia and they are nicely evergreen and good noise/visual screens. Can get pretty big but grow slowly. An ag consultant recommended planting those on one border near the house where we wanted less view of a cow pasture.

Planting bamboo can be a big mistake. Like the evil Johnson grass they propagate by sending out underground rhizomes and are impossible to irradicate by “normal” methods. A good friend has a bamboll forest near a spring/creek down over the hill a 1/2 mile from his house, It’s been growing for at least 40 years and doesn’t seem to be expanding much do to the terrain restraints of the spot. It’s a wonderful source of 2-3” bambo stocks 40’ in length. We had Rose of Sharon at our last house and my wife loved it. We mowed the area and it didn’t spread, at least for the 25 years we lived there. Knowing what I know now I’d probably get rid of it.

Another plant the forester warned me about is Burning Bush. I got a sprig from my parents house in PA and planted a bush. When he saw it he educated me and advised me to eradicate it. Said it can spread like Kudzu. Another plant he said he’d remove is Leatherleaf Mahonia. Kind of attractive and evergreen but it’s spreading through one hilly 6-acre section of untouched woods and I see it on the boundaries of other better managed forested areas.

A friend visiting from Italy saw Kudzu for the first time and LOVED it! She picked some vines, thought about taking them home. I talked her out of it. I can’t imagine the legal trouble she would be in introducing Kudzu to Italy…

JKJ





John,

In Kentucky we have an abundance of honeysuckle, an over-abundance. It plagues both the farm and the house (two separate properties). Luckily, we eradicated all the invasive bamboo at the farm. The old farmer had planted one stalk despite numerous people warning him. We had to take the top several inches off of over an acre of land to eradicate the bamboo. A neighbor with property took the soil and now has his own bamboo (but he likes it). The wife likes rose of Sharon, although I thought it was rows of Sharon. We returned home yesterday from Eastern Tennessee near Cherokee Lake and noticed a lot of kudzu. It looked terrible.

At the farm, we have some Maple volunteers and those are definitely Maples. Tomorrow the pictures of those trees will be loaded. We removed a large section of decorative grass and the flag pole about 50 feet in front of the farm house and are now considering trees to put in the area this fall. So far the list of possibilities include a tulip tree (Kentucky state tree), Red Maple, Red Oak, and Blazing Maple. All those trees are native to Kentucky. We are looking for fast growers, at least initially.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Kev Williams]

Vegetation is evil. You can quote me on that. ;)

[Rich Riddle]

Here are the maples.....
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[Rich Riddle]

Vegetation is evil. You can quote me on that. ;)Ahem, don't we need trees for woodworking purposes?

[Jim Becker]

Maples can be very prolific as they are heavy seed producers. Here at this new property, I'm in round two of eliminating eleventy-ninty-gazillion of them coming up in all the landscaping! Most of them are "trash" varieties, too, rather than the nicer, more interesting maples. They grow fast and can be pretty tenacious. Occasionally, I catch sight of an interesting variety and have to consider if I would have a place to put it should I decide to allow it to grow up big and tall...sadly, with a half acre...nope.

[John K Jordan]

Vegetation is evil. You can quote me on that. ;)

OK, "Kev says vegetation is evil."

For me it depends. I love vegetation that provides food. I especially like our blueberries, cherries, peaches, apples, pears, figs, raspberries, blackberries, strawberries and vegetables from garden vegetation. On the other hand I recently took down 6 Leyland Cypress trees that simply got too big for the spot where I planted them, bigger than I was told they would get. Maybe our soil is too good. With the excavator it's only 15 minutes to take one down and pull the roots out of the ground.

Maybe 6-8 years ago I planted another in a corner of the yard by the garden in full sun. It's in perfect shape but it grew too big and is blocking my view of the horse shelter and part of the pasture. Prob 40' tall and quite wide. I'll take it out later this week and replace it with something dainty.

JKJ

[Gary Ragatz]

Contact your local agriculture extension office - they should have someone who can ID this stuff and probably give advice on what's invasive and what's not, and how to handle the stuff that is.

If you don't know how to contact your local extension office, check with the university that runs them:

Kentucky (https://extension.ca.uky.edu/)

Virginia (https://ext.vt.edu/)

[Rich Riddle]

Contact your local agriculture extension office - they should have someone who can ID this stuff and probably give advice on what's invasive and what's not, and how to handle the stuff that is.

If you don't know how to contact your local extension office, check with the university that runs them:

Kentucky (https://extension.ca.uky.edu/)

Virginia (https://ext.vt.edu/)
I had an appointment scheduled. The representatives from the extension offices in Kentucky are "extension assistants." That said, he seemed fairly knowledgeable in general things about plants and trees. He was unsure of the species of Maple from the volunteer trees in the photos but provided a guide to help discern the exact species. He also provided information on what to do in areas where the former owner planted trees three feet apart. I don't enjoy cutting down trees, but it's for the best.

Apparently, the extension assistants no longer go out in the field to help with properties.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

Post 12 looks like maple. Post 1 does not.
A place for everything, everything in its place. It takes lots of maintenance. My sister let some trees get too big too near the house. For unwanted trees, I cut close to the ground and treat the stump with Tordon. I apply a few drops with a foam brush.

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