That Early Harbinger of Fall- TheTupelo

Have you ever been driving through a wooded area in late August only to notice a tree with one or several branches turning a deep, brilliant red? This tree is of a type you've probably never particularly noticed before. Most of the year it looks so plain. Well, chances are if you've been driving east of the Mississippi River, you have noticed a Tupelo.

Nyssa sylvatica is often called black or sour gum, or black tupelo. It grows to be fairly good size tree in moist woodlands, but will tolerate soil conditions from quite wet to quite dry. Usually the very large old trees are in moist hollows. I suspect the reason we find the largest specimens on moist sites is that wild fires of the past have burned cooler on these sites and thus more have survived longer here. Black Tupelo are moderately shade tolerant and are often found in the understory of existing woodlands.

The sour gum often is one of the earliest trees to change color and can be quite brilliant. Freqently it will start changing with only a branch or two turning bright red in late August or early September after only 2 or 3 cool nights. Branching habit is generally fine with branches emerging at nearly right angles to the stem and then descending. (thus a nickname- the poultergeist tree).

Almost always the trunk becomes hollow by the time the tree attains any significant size...again possibly a result of susceptability to fire that damages the thin bark and allows decay fungi into the soft, vulnerable wood. At any rate this characteristic has given rise to the tree's most useful nature. Old timers in the mountains used to cut the trees down, section the hollow trunks, put a floor and cap on them and use them for beehives. Thus the name Bee Gums for bee hives.

There are several other species of Nyssa. N. Aquatica, yes water tupelo, is as the name implies partial to wet sites as is N. biflora, or Swamp tupelo. The Black Gum is wide spread through out the eastern United States while the water and swamp tupelos tend towards the southern coastal plains and the Mississippi River basin. The Ogeechee (Nyssa ogeche) has a very limited range and is limited to river swamps and stream banks of southe eastern Georgia and northern Florida. it tends towards a small tree or large shrub.

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