Description
Yellow birch is typically associated with later successional forests, or at least forests that have been stable for awhile. Contrast this to its cousins paper birch and gray birch which we see in earlier successional forest types. Yellow birch can get quite big, I have seen mature trees in central Maine that are 2 feet on the stump and 40 feet high. The color of the bark is seemingly translucent, reminding me of ginger ale. Makes a nice specimen tree for a partly shaded spot. Bark tends to exfoliate more than in other birches which gives it kind of a grisly unique charm.
This is the birch species preferred by the chaga mushroom, at least here in southern Maine. Each lump of chaga has a distinct personality, I knew of a specimen that looked very much like a nose growing off the side of a tree. In our forest we have Gorilla chaga, from the right angle it looks remarkably like a gorilla’s head. Coveted by many for it’s incredible nutritional and medicinal properties, despised by others, like foresters, because the state of Maine considers chaga to be a fungal pathogen damaging to trees. We should not be surprised, so many times in life an entity can be a hero to some and a villain to others, be it mushroom or man. On a side note, please be thoughtful and considerate when collecting chaga, take just a bit if you feel you must, and leave the rest. It takes an awful long time to grow, and there are many stories about people harvesting all they can carry in hopes of cashing in big, only to have it rot away in the corner.
2-3ft high specimen, well branched in a 3 gallon pot for $48
