Did I just find an Elm tree?

Leprous Garden

Yamadori
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I'm going to agree that it's not American elm, but that's as helpful as I can be
 

Leprous Garden

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Except to say it doesn't look like wild cherry of any type, the serrations are too blunt.
 

HorseloverFat

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Yeah, I do have big thumbs.
I know its going to reduce some eventually but right now I am just thickening it up a bit.
Hmmm...

You're fairly tall, no?

I honestly would've guess 'normal height'... NEAT

(Well... Normal causasian height, but it dawned on me that I do not KNOW if your are Caucasian.... It's wrong of me to assume! And I've never seen a photograph of you 🤓)
 

HorseloverFat

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Op, yes, looks Ulmus... Looks American Elm.. their leaves, in the wild, look 'crappy' in autumn, here, also.

American Elms are 'hit or miss' for bonsai applications....

SOME have leaves and internodes which will reduce through ramification, substrate and toe-room... SOME do not.

🤓

Only one way to find out, at this young age....

Wire some movement in... And grow/chop/wire/grow/chop/wire...

You'll "know" how suitable it is, after 2-3 seasons of response to "Tiny Tree Techniques"

(I see hundreds of trees that look like this, and THEY.... are all American Elm but I could be WAY off)
 

HorseloverFat

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Ulmus Americana is native almost exclusively East of the Mississippi. Might seed in introduced areas in more Western areas, but other species of trees are much more common and likely in Oregon.
Ahhh!

I did NOT, however, consider the range ..


I still think Elm .. just not AE.

(Wait a minute.... American Elms are fairly common in Oregon..... I've seen em'!!... I bet a quick Internet search would prove me right.)

Even though THIS may not be ..

AE is all over Oregon!
 

rockm

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Ahhh!

I did NOT, however, consider the range ..


I still think Elm .. just not AE.

(Wait a minute.... American Elms are fairly common in Oregon..... I've seen em'!!... I bet a quick Internet search would prove me right.)

Even though THIS may not be ..

AE is all over Oregon!
It's not a native species west of the Mississippi. Check out a wildlife/forest service/university range map. The AE that are there were planted by man. This ain't one. Leaf and leaf stem are completely wrong. Bark is wrong. A Lot is wrong about it. My money is on an alder or cherry/prunus species.
 

ShadyStump

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You're not wrong, @HorseloverFat , but native range vs planting as street trees and then naturalizing is where we're debating what the odds are of it being AE.

And was sceptical of it being one because of the leaf shape, but then the other day I passed an American elm on the street whose lower leaves were more like OP's pic.
 

HorseloverFat

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Hmmm I believe that it's not AE ... I know where it's native range IS.

I'm just saying, that even OUTSIDE it's native range, it has escaped and become one of the more common Elms IN Oregon...

Once again, I know THIS is not... Just pointing out that the LIKELIHOOD of stumbling on an American Elm in Oregon is fairly high.

Elms, rose of Sharon, and Alders are the plants I've seen with buds like that....

Ulmus Laevis escaped cultivation is ALSO all over Oregon (European White)... And it definitely didn't start there.
 

ShadyStump

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It's not a native species west of the Mississippi. Check out a wildlife/forest service/university range map. The AE that are there were planted by man. This ain't one. Leaf and leaf stem are completely wrong. Bark is wrong. A Lot is wrong about it. My money is on an alder or cherry/prunus species.
When I've researched them before I learned that their native range stops, essentially, in the states just west of the Mississippi. There are forests of them in eastern Kansas, for instance, and occasional isolated stands all the way into eastern Colorado.

And still, they've been introduced in all of the 48 contiguous states as well as areas of Canada, so naturalized populations abound in almost all settled areas with a decent winter. It's entirely too dry for them to be native in my area, yet there are hundreds all over town, almost as troublesome as the Siberians.
 

rockm

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When I've researched them before I learned that their native range stops, essentially, in the states just west of the Mississippi. There are forests of them in eastern Kansas, for instance, and occasional isolated stands all the way into eastern Colorado.

And still, they've been introduced in all of the 48 contiguous states as well as areas of Canada, so naturalized populations abound in almost all settled areas with a decent winter. It's entirely too dry for them to be native in my area, yet there are hundreds all over town, almost as troublesome as the Siberians.
Maybe so, but doesn't make this tree an American elm. Explain the leaf stem (AE don't have a leaf stem to speak of--as most elm species leaves have short ones) and lack of indentation on the leaf base.
 

ShadyStump

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Maybe so, but doesn't make this tree an American elm. Explain the leaf stem (AE don't have a leaf stem to speak of--as most elm species leaves have short ones) and lack of indentation on the leaf base.
You may be right.

Just got to thinking, there are a couple AEs growing on my fence line, and seedlings all about the yard. I grabbed a couple of pics for comparison.

American and Siberian elm seedlings in an unused grow basket.
IMG_20220915_142336_807.jpg
IMG_20220915_142308_240.jpg

The supposed parent tree of the American elm seedlings.
IMG_20220915_142441_617.jpg
Now, this is second flush foliage lower on the tree. I can't get any good pics of the original spring foliage. In my climate at least, I've noticed there can be some differences sometimes.
 

Leprous Garden

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This larger, heart shaped leaves are almost definitely not American elm. The venation is wrong, and as rock said the petioles are too long, on top of them being heart shaped rather than elliptical.
 

penumbra

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This debate still going on? Lots of people think they know what it is not.
 

Mikecheck123

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You may be right.

Just got to thinking, there are a couple AEs growing on my fence line, and seedlings all about the yard. I grabbed a couple of pics for comparison.

American and Siberian elm seedlings in an unused grow basket.
View attachment 455794
View attachment 455795

The supposed parent tree of the American elm seedlings.
View attachment 455796
Now, this is second flush foliage lower on the tree. I can't get any good pics of the original spring foliage. In my climate at least, I've noticed there can be some differences sometimes.
Those look like mulberry volunteers.
 

ShadyStump

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Those look like mulberry volunteers.
But I've never seen mulberries with these sorts of leaves. They always have those lobed leaves, or at least mostly.

Still, there is a very old mulberry in the neighbors' yard that makes a mix of the lobed and non-lobed. I assumed it was age that caused the foliage to grow differently than I'm familiar with. I was only able to identify it by the flowers in spring before a late frost killed them.
 

rodeolthr

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I'm going to suggest that this is our native bitter cherry. They grow quite large and do so rather quickly. The birds enjoy the tiny cherries and scatter them everywhere.
 
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