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vieja_gw

male or female cedar ???

vieja_gw
10 years ago

We have a very old red cedar tree that a neighbor 'nicely' says the pollen gives him allergies this time of year. I thought only the male trees gave off pollen ... this cedar produces small cones every year so I assumed it was a female! I did see a 'wave' of dusty something blow off the tree after a strong wind the other day ... could this be 'pollen' on the 'cone-bearing' tree?

Comments (4)

  • pineresin
    10 years ago

    Cedars are monoecious, with both pollen and seed cones on the same tree. This pic (by Daniel Mietchen, creative commons license) shows a Deodar Cedar with a seed cone surrounded by pollen cones:
    {{gwi:594510}}

    Maybe you are getting confused by the misuse of the name by some people when they actually mean junipers?

    Resin

  • ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
    10 years ago

    first.. you only got one answer.. because you posted this in the very infrequently used gallery side of the forum....next time.. try the discussions side ... see link

    that said.. resin is presuming your ID is thorough ...

    but CEDAR.. is such a commonly misused catchall ...

    that my gut says.. you ought t get a full and proper ID ...

    though it appears.. he answered in the general regardless ...

    what a waste of typing... lol .. but i am entertaining myself...

    ken

    ps: quite a neighbor you have there... if you get rid of your plant.. does he think all his allergies will go away.. what a rube ... he isnt suggestion such.. is he???

    Here is a link that might be useful: use this forum next time.

  • vieja_gw
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    the red cedar was Id'd by a County Extension person so I will take their word for it. And now I see when I shake the lower branches it does drop 'tons' of ?dust which I now guess is the pollen! It also has lots of the cones on it all the time. A beautifully shaped very tall tree that all the birds love all year long & since our family does not seem tto be allergic to it (or much else fortunately), the neighbor will have to wait out the allergy seasons! Now I am offended (not allergic) to all the very messy mulberry & chinese (really siberian) elms that dump their tons of seed every spring & blow nto my flower gardens & then I have the chore of pulling out the zillions of seedlings that sprout!! Illegal now to buy or plant locally (as are the beautiful Italian cypress also) but no problem ever with them disappearing as the ones already growing are still legal & they seem indestructible!

    I now have learned that not all those trees are of one sex or another! Thanks for the help!

  • mesterhazypinetum
    10 years ago

    I have no idea why the american common conifer names are sometimes not understandable for foreigners. As I know Juniperus virginiana is the Pencil cedar, meanwhile its a usual Virginia juniper. The Western Red cedar is a simply Thuja plicata, better told the Giant arborvitae. Cedars are only the Cedrus specieses.
    Years ago I watched a National Geographic video in their channel about the forests Rockies. I saw an old Thuja plicata forest, meanwhile the narrator told me about the giant Western Red Cedars. Surely the texts were not translated by botanists. I sent a mail to NG for beeing more careful in the controlling of foreign translations in the future.