North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Douglas Woodard <dwoodard@becon.org>]

I was referring to the first but not the second. Your mention of 
yellow-poplar/Liriodendron tulipifera (which we call tulip tree in 
Ontario) is interesting because it is a signature tree for the local 
forest ecosystem on our sandy loam soil, and I am involved in planting 
some in a park naturalization project here. It has become one of my 
favourite trees.

It's fast-growing, handsome, reasonably long-lived (150-250 years they 
say), grows big, a great nectar producer, and easy to establish in the 
right soils if there is adequate sun and moisture.

Regarding nitrogen fixers, that's news to me about poplars and I would 
be interested in any references you may be able to supply.

I have read of American work (Wisconsin? possibly in Aldo Leopold's 
"Game Management") and seen pictures, of growing black locust with 
conifers to greatly improve the growth rate of the conifers.

I have read of Russian work (published in the 1960s I think) using 
caragana to improve the growth of poplars.

Doug Woodard
St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada



jas39a@earthlink.net wrote:
> I didn't see the original post, but I might weigh in here....Yellow-poplar (which isn't a true poplar, but a member of the Magnolia family) pulls up Calcium and Magnesium from down deep in the soil profile, and sheds it with its leaves in the fall, thus enriching the topsoil with those bases.  
>
> Some members of the true poplar family are nitrogen-fixers, working 
> symbiotically with rhizobacteria to add nitrogen to soils.
>
> Perhaps he was referring to one of those situations?
>
> Eddie Earles
>
> -----Original Message-----
> > From: Jon Place <jonp1@comcast.net>
> > Sent: Mar 17, 2009 6:10 PM
> > To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
> > Subject: [NAFEX] "nutrient pump role"
> >
> > Doug, you referred to the "nutrient pump role" of poplar and box elder.  
> > Could you speak more about this?  Do these trees cycle nutrients into 
> > the soil for other plants?
> >
> > Thanks, Jon