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Willow family (Salicaceae)
Tree of height 30(35) m and breast-height diameter 1 m. Lives to be 100. Bark grey-green, though dark and fissured at base of trunk. Leaves short-stalked 3-8 cm long, roundish, and strongly crinkled and toothed. Upperside dark green, underside grey. In autumn, leaves turn yellow and red. Leaf stalks long and compressed laterally, rather soft and flexible, hence tendency to make specific fluttering sounds even in gentle wind. Dioecious and wind-pollinated. Flowers in the form of hanging catkins. Fruit a 2-lobed capsule. Seeds with white down, spread by wind in May and Jun. Flowers Mar.-Apr., before leaves develop. Light-loving pioneer species present on mesic soils, mainly as an admixture species in mixed/coniferous forests. The only native poplar to be typically forest-dwelling.
Descriptions devised by the team at the Independent Department of Forest Botany, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, i.e. L. Witkowska-Żuk, K. Marciszewska, W. Ciurzycki, A. Obidziński and P. Zaniewski.
