TREES IN THE WINTER LANDSCAPE

An often-overlooked landscaping opportunity is the impact that attractive tree bark can have in a garden setting. Planning a landscape should include trees that can be used to create small, interesting scenes even without leaves.

A stroll through the woods on a mild winter day can awaken ideas that help to create such garden settings. And during rain or high humidity, the dark, velvet-green mosses and light gray- green lichens clinging to many trees are colorful assets that are often ignored in home gardens.

Following are some trees worth noticing:

• Red Maple - smooth-textured, mottled light gray trunk
• Crapemyrtle - smooth reddish bark
• River Birch - bark that peels off in curly flakes
• Winged Elm - brown to gray trunk and corky wings on its twigs and branches
• Sycamores - bark that flakes off in large sheets to expose new white and green bark
• Bald Cypress - cinnamon brown trunk with long, shallow divisions

These trees and many others not mentioned have distinctive characteristics on which you can build your garden picture.

Jackie Hope, Smith County Master Gardener
Texas AgriLife Extension Service

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