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A lovely copyrighted image of the blossom of the Tulip Tree (Liriodendron tulipifera) which appears here courtesy of photographer Steven J. Wolf. Steven, an Associate Professor of Botany at California State University Stanislaus, at Turlock, California, invites you to visit his website right here. You can easily find the original image via that link. Steven, we thank you!
The webmaster would like to especially thank Steven Wolf for permitting this spectacular image to be displayed in this way. Steven does NOT like his images cropped (necessary for use with the Lake Applet) and could well have requested therefore that I NOT use his image. Had he done so, I would, of course, comply. I do know that this page brings me pleasure each time I see it and hope and trust that visitors to the site will feel the same way.
There is an amazing quantity of information available via the WWW on the Tulip Tree, often called the Yellow Poplar. In fact it is not a poplar tree at all but rather of the magnolia family. It grows from the deciduous forests of western Ontario, Canada, across the eastern third of the United States as far south as the Gulf coast and westward to Arkansas. It often grows to 150 feet and can grow to 200 feet. Millions of years ago, when the earth's climate was warmer, the tulip tree and its close relatives were widely distributed over the northern hemisphere. Today only one related species grows in China. It is, I learn, the state tree of Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Like the walnut, the tree requires deep rich soil, moist and well-drained. To the pioneers its growth was sure evidence of good farmland. Its blossom, so well photographed in Steven Wolf's image, is greenish-yellow and orange-centered.