Garden club plants anniversary tree

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Story and photos by Hillary Di Menna

The treat of a tulip tree is now living at Oshawa Valley Botanical Gardens. The Oshawa Garden Club donated the tree to the city gardens in honour of the club’s 80^th year. Their last gift was a gazebo, marking year 75.
Garden club members stood and cheered in the shining afternoon sun on May 23 as club president, Debi Foster, finished planting the tree native to Ontario.
Though technically the new addition was added a year after the club’s 80^th anniversary, no one seemed to mind the wait.

Foster said it is important to plant native trees to keep our eco-system balanced with the planting of foreign trees, such as the Manitoba maple planted not too far from the new tulip tree.
The Lake Huron Centre For Coastal Conservation says, “Native plants are plants that have evolved in a particular region over many thousands of years. Therefore, they have adapted to the climate, geography and animal populations of the region. Native plants provide habitat to and are a source of food for animals, such as birds, butterflies and mammals.”
The tulip tree, or liriodendron tulipifera if you want to give your tongue a workout, needs full sun in order to grow and have its flowers bloom. Tulips themselves grow from bulbs, but the tulip tree’s yellow-green flowers resemble tulips with their six petals. The new garden addition will grow between 25 and 30 metres tall.
Check out Ontario’s Ministry of Natural Resources for more information on tulip trees.