Tree Identification, A Spark Activity

Hi everyone! My name is Angela and we are gonna go on a little bit of an adventure together this morning we're gonna check out some common tree species that you'll find in North Carolina and I'll give you some pointers and ideas on how to identify different common trees that you're gonna see all around you when you go outside but before we talk about specific types of trees that we're going to look at today I want to talk about some of the benefits of trees for me personally trees are probably my favorite living organism on the planet they're just really cool and they do all sorts of cool things for us they're really the planets lungs and and filters so trees clean our air by filtering out particles they also produce oxygen for us to breathe which is really important and we want that oh - so that we can breathe trees also filter the water we drink the their large root systems will suck water up into the tree and then they'll release the water as water vapor through their leaves in a process called transpiration and what that does is it really filters the water it's pure water vapor when it comes out of the tree and trees are also really great for shade they keep us cool by providing shade and even in cities where there's a lot of concrete and a lot of buildings they tend to be hotter because of all of the concrete and the pavement and the buildings and the more trees that you have in your city the lower that temperatures gonna be because they help keep you cool so those are just some of the cool things that trees do there are all kinds of different types of trees in the world but the two broadest categories that you can break trees down into are evergreen trees on the one which is what you see on the stand if you're Spanier or deciduous trees or they're also known as broadleaf trees here on the right side of your screen so coniferous or evergreen they're gonna be the trees that have needles on them they produce some type of cone and they stay green all year long which means they're pretty much losing their needles or losing their needle-like thing all throughout the year whereas deciduous or broadleaf trees again what you see on the right side of your screen here those are those trees that lose their leaves in the fall so they're the ones that cause all of the bright beautiful colors they lose their leaves they don't have leaves on during the winter I mean they grow them back in the spring so those are the two broadest categories of types of trees that you can look at today we're going to be talking about deciduous or broadleaf trees those trees that turn really beautiful colors in the winter or in the fall and drop their leaves in the winter so one thing there are a lot of different ways that you can identify trees you can look at bark on trees all different types of tree species have unique bark you can look at the different types of flowers or fruits that a tree produces that will also give you information to be able to identify specific species but probably the most common way especially when you're identifying deciduous trees is to look at the leaves themselves and check out the shape and different characteristics of that leaf so here are a few things that we're going to be looking at today down in the the bottom left corner there are bunch of different types of leaf shapes so they can be smooth they can be wavy they can have lobes which is what you see on the far right and then they can also be serrated or have a really sharp edge along the outside of the leaf and that's going to be really important important for some of the species we're going to look at today another thing to take into consideration when you're looking at leaves is the actual shape of it which is what you see on the upper right hand corner here you can have a generally circular shape so that would have not very many loads on it would be circular you can have a heart shaped leaf which is is really neat and often the the stem of a heart chief heart shaped leaf excuse me that's going to be right there at the bottom so it looks like a heart that's turned upside down then all the different other types of leaf shapes that you can see here where they're they're like an oval or they're like a triangle sometimes you find them in diamonds many different shapes of leaves but these are the general categories that we're going to look at and then finally last but not least in the upper left hand corner you'll see two examples of twigs with leaves on them the one that's on the left side is what we call alternate leaves so you've got the twig in the middle and you'll see the leaves are offset from each other they've got a little bit of space in between them about in this picture it looks about maybe just an inch or so maybe a little less than that they've got space in between them and we call those alternating leaves if you look at the one on the right the twig on the right again you can see that the leaves are coming out of the same spot on that twig they're not alternating but they're opposite from each other they're coming out in the same spot on on the twig and that's another way to categorize trees types of trees and and their leaves so that's all going to be really important for information for us to use when we're looking at different tree species this morning all right so let's get into it then I've picked out five different very common tree species that you are gonna see in North Carolina and we'll start right here with this star-shaped one let's go in so here are some characteristics of this leaf and I want you to type in the comments what you think this leaf is or what tree this leaf comes from and a couple of things we just learned about serrated edges so if you look along the edges of this leaf you'll see that it's it's bumped or ridged it's serrated it's got those pointy little spikes along the edges of the leaves here this is also this leaf has a lot of lobes it actually has five lobes on it the create a star shape that's very distinct for this specific type of tree and then probably the thing that people know the most about this tree is it produces a spiky round ball that really hurts if you're running around outside and you're barefoot and you step on it does not feel good when you step on it so a spiky ball so type in the comments tell us what you think this is give me just a second to to make some guesses around what kind of tree this is all right and then let's find out what it is so this leaf is from a sweet gum tree and here are the the spikey fruit that I was just talking about I'm sure you've all seen this out on the ground again these don't feel so great when you step on them speak gum trees are one of the most common tree species in the southeastern US they're very common in North Carolina you can see in this picture on the bottom left-hand side is the seeds they live in this spiky ball and they fall out and they're ready to start to start their their process of becoming a sweet gum tree and those little seeds provide a lot of food for things like birds like finches squirrels and chipmunks and sweet gums are also one of the most important commercial species of trees and what that means is that we do things like make furniture with these trees or make plywood this tree is used a lot in plywood and furniture production all right the next one that we are going to look at is this leaf so again go ahead and type in the comments what you think this is what tree you think this comes from looking at this leaf it looks quite different from the leaf that we just looked at it is loathed also but you'll see that the lobes are much gentler this is one of those leaves that has that circular overall circular shape to it and the edges here are really smooth you don't see any of those little bumps or ridges where the serrations are and a really big key to what kind of tree species this is from the leaf is actually in the shape of a tulip so again tell us in the comments what tree you think this leaf is from we'll give you just a second you alright let's find out what it is this leaf comes from a yellow poplar yellow poplars are also known as tulip poplars again because that leaf shape it looks like a tulip if you are gonna sit down and draw the shape of a tulip you might draw something that looks really similar to the shape of these leaves these are really neat neat trees they're the tallest species in Eastern forests they grow really really tall pretty quickly relatively quickly they produce this yellow and orange flower that you can see here it has a lot of nectar and it for pollinators things like bees and hummingbirds um it's one of the the tallest species because it grows pretty quickly and it likes a lot of sunshine so it wants to get up above other trees pretty quickly so it can get all of that that Sun and it's a it's a primary successor and what I mean by that is let's say you had a field that's been farmed for for many generations and you decided we're not gonna farm this anymore we're just gonna let it grow and see what happens well that field is gonna start growing plants on it and because it doesn't have anything on it right now it's got a lot of open space there's not much shade at all like it's a lot of Sun and so tulip poplars or yellow poplars are gonna be one of the main tree species along with times that you would see grow in the first 50 to 150 years of that field lain fallow or not growing crops but growing trees and the reason that is is because this is a fast growing tree and it loves sunshine it doesn't like shade at all and so it really wants to get as much Sun as it can and the purpose of it in that first 50 to 150 years as it provides shade for other trees like Oaks and maples that do like the shade but need shade to grow when they're first growing so that's what we mean when we say it's a primary successor it's one of the first species you're gonna see grow in an ecosystem for that same reason this tree also does something else really neat but don't see often in the tree world and that is itself prunes I'd love sunshine so much that when it gets big enough that its lower limbs stop getting all of the the sunshine they get shaded out by the the top of the tree or their larger limbs further up the tree it'll actually cut off resources to that limb it will stop giving that food and water and it will die and fall off it no longer needs those leaves which are in the shade to be healthy and happy and grow so that's a really neat aspect of this tree as well you okay next tree we're gonna go down here so some characteristics of this leaf and again type in the comments if you think you know what tree this comes from this is a really great example of serrated edges you can very distinctly see the bumps and ridges along the edges of this of this leaf again this is one of those leaves that has that generally circular shape but it does have these V's here that separate the lobes of the leaf this leaf is or this tree is really beautiful in the fall and it can range in color from yellow to orange to bright scarlet red so what do you think this is what kind of tree is this you all right this leaf is from a red maple tree which is again one of the most common tree species that you're gonna see in the eastern and central u.s. now maples there are a lot of different species of maples this is a red maple that we're looking at here and that's what you're gonna find commonly in North Carolina but maple trees in general are most often native to Asia and there's actually only one species of maple that you will even find in the southern hemisphere so below the equator in places like South America why do you think that is type in the comments here why do you think you might only find one species of maple in the southern hemisphere and if you guessed that it's because they like cooler weather that is correct maples and generally in general like cooler weather and so that's why you find them in the northern hemisphere or above the equator um maple trees are really the ones that are responsible for the the most brilliant colors that you're gonna see and fall forests and then just in addition excuse me to red maples you'll find yellow maples sugar maples which are found more commonly up north in the northern United States and then into Canada as well they turn a really bright brilliant orange in the fall and are beautiful um they're also used to make maple syrup they have a naturally high and sugar syrup or SAP excuse me that comes out of out of the tree and we take that SAP and we boil it down and concentrate it down to make maple syrup just a really cool thing that trees give us all right so we're gonna check out this leaf now and this is a really unique a unique leaf and one thing that I will point out is this long lobe at the top that sticks out of it almost like a finger this is a very distinct characteristics characteristic of this specific tree so keep check that out this long lobe at the top that's gonna be a dead giveaway for what type of tree this is when you see it outside another specific feature of this is kind of hard to see in the picture but each of these lobes comes to a sharp point and actually has a little spike on the end of it it's not sharp it won't hurt you but it is a little spike and that is very distinct about this specific type of leaf and entry species squirrels also love to eat this trees fruit so tell us what you think it is put it in the comments what kind of tree is this leaf from all right if you said oak tree you are correct and like maples there are many different types of oak species and this is a southern red oak in particular and so remember how I told you about that lobe that was sticking up we'll go back and look at that this lobe up here that looks like a finger and then these little spikes on the tips of the lobes tells you that this is a red oak and that that lobe that sticks up at the top that finger that points up that tells you that's the southern red oak all oak trees produce tannic acid and it's something that they store in their acorns and it tastes bitter and it helps it helps protect the tree from from predators and we'll come back to that in just a minute but North America again this is really common North America contains the largest number of oak species in the world Oaks are very very common in North America and actually if you are from Raleigh or the Raleigh area you will know that the capital city of our state is called the City of Oaks and that's because there are so many oak trees in the city and and in this area they're very common all right and then finally last but not least we'll check out leaf number five here and now we're back to smooth edges you can see on this there are no serrations all of these lobes and edges are very smooth and that's another characteristic of this leaf is it has a lot of lobes and not any one particular any one particular load is longer or bigger than the others they're all about the same size we've already seen a tree in this from this species this is just a specific kind another specific kind of specie so tell us what is it what do you think what type of tree do you think this leaf comes from you all right and if you guessed an oak tree you're right again this is a white oak tree and squirrels love white oak acorns even more than they love red oak acorns and that's because remember how we talked about tannic acid at all oak trees produce tannic acid that they store in their acorns white oaks don't produce as much tannic acid as red oaks do and what that means is that they're eight corns or yummier just squirrels they don't taste quite as bitter so squirrels when they are storing up nuts for the winter that's how they make sure that they've got enough food to make it through the winter they're gonna they're gonna store more white oak acorns than they will red oak acorns and squirrels and trees have a have a really cool mutually beneficial relationship so trees are gonna provide habitat for squirrels to build their nests they live and sleep in trees and then they also provide food the acorns from oak trees in particular are one type of nuts or fruit that a squirrel is gonna store up and eat over the winter but what's really cool about this and the the benefit to the tree from the squirrel as you'll see in this picture right here this girl has taken an acorn and he is about to bury that acorn in the ground squirrels will store acorns in trees but they will also bury them all over the place in the ground and they will come back when they want to eat that acorn in the winter but they don't remember every place that they've buried an acorn so what that means is that they don't eat all of them so essentially you have squirrels out there planting thousands of trees every fall they're helping to disperse those acorns a cornice what the new tree grows up out of so not only are they storing their food for the winter but they're planting new trees which is I think super cool all those squirrels that are creating new forests out there every fall all right folks well thank you so much for your time these are just a five of some of the most common tree species that you're going to see in North Carolina I encourage you to get out there with your family get outside with your parents and go on a scavenger hunt see if you can find find these trees out there they all have a pretty distinct leaf shape and so you slit you've just learned and get out there and go find those trees in your backyard or in your neighborhood these trees you're gonna find everywhere all across North Carolina so be safe out there and we hope you have fun thanks for joining us for this presentation about common trees in North Carolina

Channel: North Carolina 4-H

Views: 1,611

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Id: 1wmFdVx2n-g

Length: 20min 54sec (1254 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 16 2020