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This morning's botanical classification "discoveries". (I'm sure there is more accurate educational jargon for learning new things, particularly correcting misapprehensions and assumptions):
* The genus name of sweet gums is Liquidambar, hence the Californian term Liquid Amber. It's a nursery ornamental here, but native to the south east.
* Liquidambar sp. are not in the "Sycamore" family but Altingiaceae** My dad called the sweet gum a type of sycamore, and when i moved to Philly and was exposed to the American Plane tree (natives there, not the more cultivated London Plane) i saw why: both had the hanging round seed pod.
* Turns out "Sycamore" sucks as a useful classification. Sycamores of the Bible are a type of fig, the sycamore of England is a type of maple, and in US it's commonly applied to the Plane trees. Pfft. Oh, and the fig tree has heart shaped leaves, so the leaf shapes aren't even similar.
* Plane trees - i grew to know and love these in Philly. Our last apartment in the city was on the third floor, with an eastern window that looked down a Plane lined street. The light through the trees and then through the window was a seasonally changing delight. Plane trees are in the Platanaceae, the plane tree family. The order is Proteales, which is a much more ancient genealogy than the Saxifragales.
* Maples are in order Sapindales, in at larger grouping of Rosids to which Saxifragales are closely related. Oaks are in Rosids, too.
** Altingiaceae has liquidambars (eastern US, east Asia, Turkey), Altingia (southeast Asia), and Semiliquidambar (a family that looks like it will be redefined simply as a hybrid between the two other genuses). Apparently all of these genus used to be considered in the Hamamelidaceae (witch-hazel family). Both are in the order Saxifragales.
* The genus name of sweet gums is Liquidambar, hence the Californian term Liquid Amber. It's a nursery ornamental here, but native to the south east.
* Liquidambar sp. are not in the "Sycamore" family but Altingiaceae** My dad called the sweet gum a type of sycamore, and when i moved to Philly and was exposed to the American Plane tree (natives there, not the more cultivated London Plane) i saw why: both had the hanging round seed pod.
* Turns out "Sycamore" sucks as a useful classification. Sycamores of the Bible are a type of fig, the sycamore of England is a type of maple, and in US it's commonly applied to the Plane trees. Pfft. Oh, and the fig tree has heart shaped leaves, so the leaf shapes aren't even similar.
* Plane trees - i grew to know and love these in Philly. Our last apartment in the city was on the third floor, with an eastern window that looked down a Plane lined street. The light through the trees and then through the window was a seasonally changing delight. Plane trees are in the Platanaceae, the plane tree family. The order is Proteales, which is a much more ancient genealogy than the Saxifragales.
* Maples are in order Sapindales, in at larger grouping of Rosids to which Saxifragales are closely related. Oaks are in Rosids, too.
** Altingiaceae has liquidambars (eastern US, east Asia, Turkey), Altingia (southeast Asia), and Semiliquidambar (a family that looks like it will be redefined simply as a hybrid between the two other genuses). Apparently all of these genus used to be considered in the Hamamelidaceae (witch-hazel family). Both are in the order Saxifragales.
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