A mile of beautiful blossoming trees - Boston Ave in Medford

[ron_newman]

The whole length of Boston Avenue in Medford, from the top of Tufts University all the way down the hill to West Medford, is in gorgeous white blossom right now. It won't last long, so go see it now.

Can someone tell me what kind of trees these are? Cherries, crabapples, something else?

Comments

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

I think they're Bradford Pears. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Callery_Pear). They're pretty, but they tend to break in high winds.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_meej_/]

Some form of Flowering Pear (aka Callery Pear, scientific name Pyrus calleryana), anyway. Bradfords are one of the more common cultivars, and are indeed prone to breaking in high winds; some of the other cultivars that have been developed since are much less prone to breaking due to their branching habits. Not sure which ones Boston Ave has; I think they're old and established enough that Bradford is a likely bet, but I don't recall them as being that stiffly upright.

[squirrelitude]

They also have some invasiveness potential, and the flowers sometimes smell godawful.

[contradictacat.livejournal.com]

Though thankfully they haven't yet, at least not when I've been around them. And trust me- if they're smelling, you'll smell it. It's an incredibly pungent, acrid odor. I'm going to just chalk it up to the wind that's been around lately that's been why I haven't been smelling them. Though, that does mean I've been going around with my nose metaphorically braced for a few days now for an assault that hasn't happened.

[flightofideas.livejournal.com]

They started smelling today. I'm near Boston and North, and we have one out front of our apartment and I'm starting to get whiffs of the unfortunate fishy odor. :(

[djethan.livejournal.com]

It is really outstanding! My wife and I live 2 blocks away and have been commenting on how nice it is. Definitely worth a walk, run, bike ride or even a car ride down the street to see it!

[clevernonsense.livejournal.com]

almost always a decorative (non fruiting) pear or dogwood, but I don't know specifically.

Moody St. in Waltham is also completely decked out.

[molyflogs.livejournal.com]

I saw Moody St. over the weekend, and it was really pretty.

[ronhaha108.livejournal.com]

any pix?

[ron_newman]

Try http://www.ravingwanderer.com/images/Boston%20Ave%2001.jpg

[ronhaha108.livejournal.com]

ahhh, very nice!

[smammy]

Sign of spring #34,981: Boston Ave smells like jizz.

[pywaket.livejournal.com]

See also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHze0SqB5Zg

[ravingwanderer.livejournal.com]

Here's a picture I took this afternoon (looking west from the Medford Hills corner):

[ron_newman]

There seems to be something wrong with your web server, as you have it set to serve the photo directly if I type its URL ( http://www.ravingwanderer.com/images/Boston%20Ave%2001.jpg ) directly into my browser, but not if it is included on a LiveJournal web page. Can you fix that?

[ravingwanderer.livejournal.com]

Fixed I think.

[ron_newman]

Much better now!

(what web server are you using, and what setting did you need to change?)

[ravingwanderer.livejournal.com]

Hosting is by A Small Orange (http://www.asmallorange.com/), they have a Cpanel interface for permitting image hotlinking by referrer.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

We have one of those across the street too; it's very nice.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

I was there on Sunday, took note of it, and was going to post about it myself, then I got the notification that you had and was glad since honestly, I probably would have forgotten. :)

(There's also a particularly gorgeous one on Highland Rd next to the bike path.)

[hikermtnbiker.livejournal.com]

Beautiful. Thanks.

On a related note, does anyone know what the predominant tree is in Davis Sq. proper? I've always found these trees quite unattractive. They don't bloom in the spring nor change color in the fall and they drop all those crappy berries and seed pods on the ground. They don't even have a nice shape. Only good thing is they are green. Makes me wish for the trees on Boston Ave. or the oaks and maples that lined the streets where I grew up.

[zard.livejournal.com]

You might be talking about the ginko trees. I know that there are some down at the Goodwill end, because we were trying to figure out if the ginko nuts were edible.

[djethan.livejournal.com]

I suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder here. If these are gingko tress, I think the leaves themselves are awesome. HOWEVER, female gingko trees at certain points have a stench that is 100 times worse than the flowering pear trees discussed here. The female gingko tree can smell like the worst dog poo you can imagine. Thus many people plant only male gingko trees.

Wikipedia authors describe the smell as rancid butter or vomit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginkgo_biloba

[ratatosk.livejournal.com]

Do you mean the thornless honey locusts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honey_locust)? I think beauty might be in the eye of the beholder there, since I kind of like them. But I also hate the Callery pears.

Interestingly, the USGS map on the Wikipedia page thinks they aren't native to MA, but the USDA's database has a completely different map (http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=GLTR&mapType=nativity&photoID=gltr_002_ahp.tif). Huh.