September 29, 2003

Deodara

The Sweet Olive* tree of previous appearances here is now in the “nearer presence of its Lord.”

There’s now a Cedrus deodara standing easily twice as tall (10′) where Olive stood before. It’s an impressive plant. Its lower branches bend downward, then up again. Branchlets are densely pubescent and droop down at the tips. The bark is dark brown, sometimes nearly black, smooth on young trees, becoming fissured with age.

The tree has an overall feathery, whorly look about it. Though quite unlikely where we planted it, it can grow up to 150′ tall and have a 40′ ground spread. Deodara were once an important source of timber in India.

It makes quite an event of reproduction. Male “banana-shaped” (honest) catkins produce clouds of yellow, wind-blown pollen in early spring. The bluish-green female cones are egg-shaped (OK, cool it) and release little seeds with papery wings. Like baby kittens, we don’t yet know which we got, but expect it’ll be quite a show when the time comes. We’ll let you know.

And, oh yes. Olive, remember, was also called “devilwood.” In Sanskrit, deodar means “timber of the gods.”

*Note to new readers: Previous OoN pages reported a devilwood tree in our yard being moved around from a showy location out front to an also-ran spot in a backyard cistern. Some of us had grown rather fond of it in the process of its trek (it actually got fan mail). It was hauled off in ignominy in a brush pile last week. As you might understand, this was not easy.

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