The Monday Garden, November 14, 2004, Issue 138
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GREAT AMERICANS: ASHES AND ELDERS
To many humans, box elders and ashes are respectively trash and treasure. Nine out of 10 squirrels, however, disagree about the box elder.
The box elder (Acer negundo), a native maple, is considered a “trash tree” in that it’s a hardy, weedy tree that grows fast and dies fast, dropping limbs all over in storms. The wood’s soft and is rumored to be used for (you guessed it) boxes. Alternatively, the name is said to come from the resemblance of the lumber to that of boxwoods. The box elder is good for windbreaks and naturally ranges from Zone 2 in southern Saskatchewan, west to Texas, and south to Zone 9 in parts of Mexico. It has become an invader in Europe.
Our premiere native ash, the white ash (Fraxinus Americana), in contrast, is a gloriously slow-growing, tall hardwood tree. It “plays well with others”, and makes light shade so it is easy on the lawn, even if this ash is also a prolific maker of seedlings. The white ash is the source of the prized light, strong, flexible wood used to make that Great American icon the baseball bat, among other things Americana such as hoe handles, arrows, oars, snow shoes and tennis rackets. Ashes are native to all Northern temperate zones; North American has about 16 species.
pictures: a young box elder at Cove Island in Stamford CT and an young ash along the Mill River in Stamford CT, both 2003.
When it comes to trees, sometimes humans have a hard time knowing trash from treasure. (Squirrels do not have this problem—they always know a good thing when they see it). Depressingly for us, the box elder is called the “ash-leafed maple” because it so closely resembles the native ashes. Both the ashes and the box elders have opposite buds and compound leaves. To make identification even more difficult, the ashes also have winged seeds (“samaras”) like the maples.
