I’ve been busy working on a new website that I had been contemplating building for a while. Ghetto Palm is something of a fan site for an unusual tree, Ailanthus altissima, the Tree-of-heaven. I want to collect any and all popular (I mean, non-scientific) references to the tree that I can find and put them up on the web. It’s a bit of an odd idea I know, but you have to understand I work with trees for a living so I can’t help but get a little attached to some of them. You can read my too-wordy rationale about why I am doing this. If you’ve spent any time in the northern half of the US, you’ve almost certainly seen this tree whether you know it or not. If you’ve an interest in this tree as well, stop by or send anything you have my way. I’ll be happy to put it up on the site and credit you appropriately.
Ghetto Palm
Published by bingregory
Official organ of an American Muslim in Malaysian Borneo, featuring plants, pantuns and pictures from the Malay archipelago. Oversharing since 2002. View more posts
hay bro. its chanol. well me and my pal zayn have been brothers for over 20 years and in the D we have had our run ins with the ghetto palm. almost every day. fast shad that can bust up the concret jungle better then any other tree. mabey thats a good thing. up in muskegon my new place of rez. the palm is just as concret busting as it was in detroit. my father in law called it the ghetto palm one day and i was rollen in my chair.
I happened to pick up Gardening With Nature by James van Sweden, the foremost american landscape architect of the day along with his partner Wolfgang Oehme. IN the first chapter he describes his main influences then goes on to tell how he got started back in l971 when he asked Oehme to help him landscape the backyard of his old two-story victorian rowhouse in the Georgetown area of Washington DC. “Almost immediately my garden became a showplace. No one had ever seen anything quite like it… the high canopy of the Ailanthus altissima gives the space a tropical quality…” And a few pages later he says “the scent of Magnolia virginiana blossoms perfume the terrace in the cool of the evening while the cicadas sing from my Ailanthus altissima.”
Since one of my greatest fears is that ghetto palm seed will contaminate the leaves that I bring in from the village to use in my reforestation project, I was relieved to read in Michigan Trees by Burton and Barnes that “Ailanthus rarely colonizes natural habitats.”
Wow I never knew that so many things would reference or have some kinda relation to this tree! Cool stuff bro! 🙂