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| Leaf Photo by: Bill Cook |
Bark Photo by: John Ruter |
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| Fruit Photo by: David lee |
Tree Photo by: Natural Resources Canada, Canadian Forest Service |
Blue beech wood is very strong and was used to make tool handles by early settlers.
Blue beech is found in Southern Ontario, in forested areas around the edges of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, but also found around Pembroke and Renfrew and on Manitoulin Island.
Blue beech may also be known as musclewood for its muscle-like ridges on the smooth-gray trunks, and if often confused as a small beech tree. Leaves are bluish-green, with fine teeth, and becoming successively larger along the shoots. The small nuts are surrounded by a leaf-like bract, becoming brown in late fall, and hanging in clusters.
Blue beech is useful for naturalized understory planting but is also adaptable to urban sites and can even be used as a pruned hedge once established.
Size: Up to 8 m tall
Moisture: Prefers moist and can tolerate seasonal flooding
Shade: Can tolerate full shade, and full sun with ample moisture
Soil: Prefers rich, well-drained soils
Planting Tip: Blue beech is best transplanted as a young, container-grown tree. Before mulching, you can layer 3 cm of mature compost in a wide ring around the tree on poorer soils. More tips...
