My favorite blooms in early July decorate an unusual tree, once commonly found throughout Illinois and other nearby states. It’s a catalpa tree that was growing in the backyard when I moved in, and around the Fourth of July hundreds of white blooms that look like popcorn emanated from the large, heart-shaped leaves.
This specimen had concrete in the trunk, apparently placed there by the previous homeowner to keep it alive.
At first it appeared to be a southern catalpa as opposed to the northern catalpa, both of which grow here, and depending on whom you ask are native. The southern catalpa grows with a more rounded crown, while the northern shoots up tall into the sky.
One of the distinguishing features of the southern catalpa is that crushing its leaves creates a somewhat unpleasant odor. I crushed the leaves of my catalpa and there was no odor, and now after reading about the tree’s history in Illinois and nearby states, it could even be a hybrid of the two.
In the mid-1800s, Robert Douglas, who owned a nursery in Waukegan, experimented with catalpa trees, touting them as providing the best and most easily available wood for building railroad ties and fence posts. Oaks were often used in railroad ties because of their hard wood. Oaks are also slow growers, and were used for many purposes by the European settlers.
So Douglas and other nursery owners and farmers began planting catalpas in large quantities, hoping to sell the wood.
Douglas became known as the largest grower of pines and spruces in the United States, according to Lake County historian Diana Dretske. He also started the Lake County Fair as an arbor and floral exhibit at Waukegan’s courthouse in 1849, Dretske writes in her Lake County history blog: (http://lakecountyhistory.blogspot.com).
His catalpa experiment, however, was a bit of a failure. Douglas touted the northern catalpa, he called the hardy catalpa, which produced wood hard enough to be used in railroad ties and fence posts. It supposedly grew much faster than oak trees did. But the southern catalpa’s wood was soft and unsuitable for use.
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“Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to tell the two catalpa breeds apart from their seeds and seedlings,” wrote Roger Matile, in a blog about the history of the Fox River region in Illinois. “Even more unfortunate was the tendency of hardy catalpas to instantly crossbreed when anywhere even moderately close to southern catalpa,” he wrote: (https://historyonthefox.wordpress.com).
Unscrupulous salesmen also sold southern catalpa tree seeds as hardy catalpa tree seeds, and in the end none were really suitable for building railroad ties that would last.
Whether a northern, southern or hybrid, each catalpa tree produces copious white flowers with purple and orange patches inside, in early summer. Later, the trees develop long, cigar-like green seed pods, which eventually turn brown. When my dad was growing up, he and his friends would collect one of the seed pods from a catalpa tree and pretend they were smoking cigars; hence, the old-fashioned name, cigar tree.
Alas, the trunk of my backyard catalpa got too weak and the tree had to be removed. In its place now stands the native serviceberry, which offers fruits to birds in early summer.
That’s not the end of the story of the catalpa tree in my yard, though. Two catalpas one in my front yard and another in the back were planted by squirrels (likely from seeds of the original catalpa) and grew quickly until they began blooming in July.
Catalpa trees can be messy as the popcorn blooms descend all over the driveway and yard in July. That might be why folks don’t plant them much anymore. For now, the catalpas in my yard serve as a link to history, and also as blooming specimens to admire in the heat of summer.
Sheryl DeVore has worked as a full-time and freelance reporter, editor and photographer for the baiduhai and its subsidiaries. She’s the author of several books on nature and the environment. Send story ideas and thoughts to [email protected].