Re: [aroid-l] Artificial trees

From: Jonathan Ertelt jonathan.ertelt at vanderbilt.edu> on 2003.01.11 at 21:42:09(9814) At 3:12 PM -0500 1/11/03, Harry Witmore wrote: I have tried dogwood but the bark come away quickly and the wood rots after a few years. I think red cedar would do fine but it's hard to locate a tree that look good. They tend to grow straight up. A gnarly oak would fit the bill but I think the bark would rot quickly. +More At 12:41 PM 1/11/2003 -0500, you wrote: Thank you for the incredible photos! I must get to Fairchild soon. I wonder how long a gnarly piece of oak would last in my greenhouse. Has anyone used real wood for a display of this kind? Valerie Gillman > I took some pictures of the trees at Fairchild and Selby As I think that I mentioned in a previous post on this topic, sassafras has a good track record as a fairly hard wood that does not lose it's bark quickly - I've had branches of assafras lasting better than ten years with no visible decay except right where the hanging wire is going through the bark and wood, and not much there. Also, I've used oasge orange, a.k.a. hedge apple, a.k.a. Maclura pomifera as suspended branches, and had them last for better than 15 years with little sign of deterioration, and that with a fairly heavy epiphyte load on them in a greenhouse with periodic misting. Both these trees would work well - the latter does have spines/thorns present, especially apparent on younger branches. Good Growing. Jonathan

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