Pretty cool how trees can grow and engulf things. Do you save chunks like that to display? I have several that I put aside including a piece of Norway maple that grew around a guy wire.
No I will trim off enough fence to cut it in 2 and make splits. I saved one piece of oak that had an ID plate attached.
I did not realize, until just now when I looked up sugarberry, that sugarberry is the same as hackberry. And also did not know that the berries are good to eat....
I’ve got a few small ones in my yard that the birds must have planted. It’s hard for any saplings to survive the firewood traffic. I worked at a house in an old neighborhood that had a mature grove of Hackberry. They are not as common as Oak, Hickory, Red Maple and Pines. Probably the second time I’ve scored any.
Very few and far between here IME. I know of only two off the top of my head including one in the front yard of my folks old place. Kind of a bucket list score for me even though its not great btu's.
I got a hold of some nice sized hackberry from a tree service. Couple of logs that were maybe 16” or so….maybe a bit bigger. I might still have one or two. If I do, I will mill them and take pictures.
Sugarberry and hackberry hybridize so much that I don’t really see true sugarberry or hackberry anymore. I was taught that the hackberry had a little rougher bark and the leaves had more jagged serrations. The berries are at least 95% seed and only 5% flesh. Back when I used to bird hunt in the fall, if I got thirsty I would get a small handful to sort of chew/suck on and it would help a bit. Stimulate saliva more than provide any moisture. To me they tasted a bit like sweet tea.
So VT dendro shows them being different. But from what I can tell from their small maps, they don't really show any of them being here, which is incorrect. Seems that what we have almost looks like a mixture of the pics for hackberry and sugarberry. Always just thought/ said/heard what we have is hackberry. It seems to make good/decent firewood, just can go off faster than some other species.
Hackberry is Celtis occidentalis Sugarberry is Celtis laevigata The leaves on Hackberries look wider with deeper serrations. In the hemp family.
From what I remember the leaves on our "hackberry are narrower. But the trees are often "wartier" than the pics of the sugarberry....more like then pics of hackberry.
