Fall on Staten Island
In The Shadow of Sweetgum Trees

Outside my window in Building 2N, I can watch the late afternoon light of the early autumn as it illuminates the Sweetgum trees (Liquidambar styraciflua). These tall trees, easily identified by their star-shaped leaves and their spiky hanging seed pods, are prominent throughout campus. Sweetgums are of the family Hamamelidaceae, which also contains Red Gum, White Gum, Star-leaved Gum, Alligator Tree, Blisted, and Satin Walnut. All of the trees of this family produce a sweet-scented "gum," which has commercial applications in salves, soaps, adhesives and tobacco flavoring; as October sets in, you can smell this scent as the leaves turn their warm crimson colors and fall.

Links of interest:
|| Paul P. Kormanik's Excellent Overview of Sweetgum History and Ecology ||
|| Michael W. Davidson of Florida State University's Tree Micoscropy Site ||
|| The American Philosophical Society's History of Horticultural Authorship, with wonderful images from Mark Catesby's Hortus Europae Americanus: Collection of 85 Curious Trees and Shrubs, the Produce of North America (1767) ||

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