Liriodendron

The tulip liriodendron species ( Liriodendron tulipifera ), better known as the tulip tree , hails from the eastern part of North America ; Another type of Chinese liriodendron ( Liriodendron chinense ) is naturally found in southern China and Vietnam .

Both species are fast-growing, getting along well on the wet soils of a temperate climate. The hybrid look of Liriodendron tulipifera x L. chinense grows even faster than each of its parents.

Like many other plants, the lyriodendron became extinct in Europe as a result of large-scale glaciation during the Ice Age . Fossil remains of this plant, which once grew in the circumpolar zone, are found in Europe, as well as in other places outside the natural range.

The height of the highest known tulip tree is about 57 m, which within the range is comparable only with some types of pines and hemlocks .

Both types of lyriodendron are high deciduous trees with deep-rusted bark (the height of the Chinese lyriodendron reaches 30 m, and the tulip liriodendron often exceeds 50 m). Trees, especially the American species, often rise above the crowns of other deciduous trees, such as maples and oaks . The liriodendron is easily recognized by the shape of the crown, where the upper branches bend in one direction.

The simplest distinguishing feature of these plants is the unusual shape of the leaves - lyre-shaped, in most cases consisting of four lobes, with obverse heart-shaped, notched apex. The size of the leaves varies between 8-22 cm long and 6-25 cm wide, and on average in the Chinese species it is somewhat larger. The leaf stalk is 4–18 cm long. The leaves of young trees are, as a rule, larger and cut up to a greater degree as compared with more mature trees. In autumn, the leaves turn yellow or yellow-brown and then fall off. Leaf arrangement of the next. Buds are large, blunt, with 2 scales.

The flowers are bisexual, in appearance very reminiscent of tulip flowers, solitary, 3-10 cm in diameter, greenish-yellow (in tulip tulip with a orange speck). The perianth has 9 leaves, three of which are external in the form of ovate-lanceolate, greenish-white, rapidly falling sepals and six broadly ovate, light green internal, in the form of petals . The flowers of tulip's lyriodendron exude a faint cucumber aroma. Stamens and pistils are arranged spirally around the spike; stamens fall off, and pistils become winged .

The fruit is a cone-shaped formation consisting of single or double seedes 4–9 cm long, each of which contains approximately a tetrahedral seed , attached at one end to a cone-shaped spike, and the other to a wing.

Wood with core and sapwood ; the sapwood is whitish, often in dark stripes and spots, the core (probably pathological) is light yellow, greenish and red-brown. Year rings and rays are clearly visible. Vessels with perforations. Intervascular porosity is opposite, less often ladder. Fibers with rare fine fringed pores. Wood absent-minded. Tree parenchyma terminal. Rays are heterogeneous.

Within the limits of the genus, there are no particular differences in the signs of the structure of wood.

Liriodendron tulip ( Liriodendron tulipifera ) in the United States, where it is known as the "yellow poplar", is of great forest industry importance. In the English technical literature is referred to as "white tree" or "canary white tree." The wood is light, well processed and polished; used for the production of peeled plywood , on the body of musical instruments and radios, as carpentry and container wood, on the balance sheets for the paper industry, etc.

The genus includes two types:

• Liriodendron chinense ( Hemsl. ) Sarg. - Chinese liriodendron, or Chinese tulip tree ^[4]
• Liriodendron tulipifera L. - Tulip liriodendron , or tulip tree now ^[4] , or lyran ^[4]

In the case of a neighborhood, they easily interbreed with each other, forming a third, hybrid type.

• Genus 3. Liriodendron - Liriodendron L. // Trees and Shrubs of the USSR. Wild, cultivated and promising for introduction. / Ed. Toma S. Ya. Sokolov . - M. - L .: Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR , 1954. - T. III. Angiosperms. Trohodendron families are Rosaceae. - pp. 96-100. - 872 s. - 3000 copies
• Genus * Tulip tree - Liriodendron L. // Flora of the USSR : in 30 t. / Ch. ed. V.L. Komarov . - M. L .: Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR , 1937. - T. 7 / ed. volume B. K. Shishkin . - p. 565-566. - 792, XXVI p. - 5200 copies
• Hunt, D. (ed). 1998. Magnolias and their allies . International Dendrology Society & Magnolia Society. ( ISBN 0-9517234-8-0 )

• Parks, CR, Wendel, JF, Sewell, MM, & Qiu, Y.-L. (1994). Liriodendron tulipifera complex (Magnoliaceae). Amer. J. Bot. 81 (7): 878–889 abstract and first page
• Parks, CR, Miller, NG, Wendel, JF and McDougal, KM (1983). Genetic diversity within the genus Liriodendron (Magnoliaceae). Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden 70 (4): 658-666 abstract and first page
• Moriaty, William. The Tulip Tree in Central Florida
• Liriodendron chinense
• Liriodendron chinense trunk and flowers
• Kew: Plants: Tulip Trees, Liriodendron tulipifera & Liriodendron chinense
• Flora of China draft account of Magnoliaceae (site currently down; see google cache )
• Liriodendron tulipifera images at bioimages.vanderbilt.edu