Post your colourful Autumn tree pics

[Callie]

Ginkgo!

ooh ginko! is that a ginko?! i was wondering around london town once and spotted some of them lining a road..somewhere posh, maybe near st james park

anyway i always assumed ginko was exotic and would like somewhere hot

now i see loads all over the place - they loves it here!

didnt know they went lellow - v. pretty

 

[_pH_]

Yep, Ginkgo biloba. Lovely tree. And they iz all blokey trees (lady ginkgos have stinky berries so no-one plants them. Poor lady ginkgos )

 

[Callie]

aww they never make baby trees? thats sad

i suppose tree sex isnt that exciting anyway - it mostly involves bees

 

[_pH_]

Poor baby ginkgos

 

[Callie]

hang on a minute - you get girl trees and boy trees???

i did not know this

is a bit scary

is that why they say you only get fruit(y) if there are other same trees in the vicinity?

why cant they make their own babies? dont they all make flowers with stamens and....the other bit?

 

[_pH_]

i suppose tree sex isnt that exciting anyway - it mostly involves bees

Tree sex is

Some trees have boy flowers, some have girl flowers, some have both. Tree transexuals

 

[_pH_]

hang on a minute - you get girl trees and boy trees???

i did not know this

is a bit scary

is that why they say you only get fruit(y) if there are other same trees in the vicinity?

why cant they make their own babies? dont they all make flowers with stamens and....the other bit?

[nerd]

Trees (and all other plants really) can be dioecious (separate boy & girl plants; androecious plants have male flowers, gynoecious plants have female flowers) or monoecious (separate boy and girl flowers on same plant), or hermaphrodite (boy bits (stamens) and girl bits (pistil - 'the other bit' ) on the same flower)

BUT: monoecious plants sometimes have mechanisms for preventing self pollination so may need to cross-pollinate

E.g.: Alder trees (Alnus) have boy flowers (catkins) and girl flowers (cones) on same plants (monoecious)

Hollies have separate boy plants and girl plants so a girl holly only gets berries if there is a boy holly nearby to pollinate (dioecious). Although Ilex 'J.C. van Tol' has both so is self fertile.

Apples are hermaphrodite (man-bits and lady-bits in the same flower) but self-infertile so need pollen from a nearby plant to fertilise and make apples (although some are triploid and need 2 pollinators, but we won't go into that here)

[/nerd]

 

[Callie]

ahh ok

i promise not to make you talk to me about trees in the pub all night

i think im getting it out of my system now

 

[_pH_]

ahh ok

i promise not to make you talk to me about trees in the pub all night

i think im getting it out of my system now

Oh, don't worry, I could go on about it for hours

You are very funny and like trees

I think I love you