Elm Family:-

The Elms are "lofty deciduous trees with rough bark and stalked, roughly downy toothed alternate leaves, varying from pointed oval to lanceolate, often asymetrical, and turning yellow in the autumn; for identification leaves must be taken from typical shoots on the tree, not from suckers. Flowers showing as a thick tuft of reddish stamens on the bare twigs, well before the leaves. Fruit a pale green, notched disc, about 1/2 inch wide, round the seed; shed in May.

Our Elms vary widely, especially in the Midlands and East England. Seven species or microspecies are recognised, all of which freely produce fertile hybrids, thus making certain identification beyond the Common and Wych Elms often extremely difficult. The 5 others are:-

• Ulmus stricta (Aiton) Lindley
• Ulmus coritana Melville
• Ulmus carpinifolia Gleditsch (Ulmus nitens Moench)
• Ulmus plotii Druce
• Ulmus diversifolia Melville"

from Collins Pocket Guide to Wild Flowers by David McClintock and R.S.R. Fitter assisted by Francis Rose - ISBN 0 00 219363 9 - Eleventh Impression 1978.

Elm Family plant table with its Common Name - Botanical Name. Flowering Months Range. Habitat with link to that Wild Flower Gallery:-

Common Name

Botanical Name

Flowering Months

Habitat

Common Elm
(English Elm, Atinian Elm)

Ulmus procera

(Ulmus campestris)

February-March

A large wide-topped tree, often considered a definitive component of the English countryside, found in hedgerows and field-borders, rarely in woodland but sometimes forming small copses. It prefers the deep and moist soils of major river systems. Lowland.

Flower

Flowers

Foliage

Form from Somerset in May

Leafsnap: An Electronic Field Guide

Columbia University, the University of Maryland, and the Smithsonian Institution are working on visual recognition software to help identify species from photographs. Leafsnap is the first in a series of electronic field guides being developed to demonstrate this new technology. This free mobile app helps identify tree species from photographs of their leaves and contains beautiful high-resolution images of their flowers, fruit, petiole, seeds, and bark. Leafsnap currently includes the trees of New York City and Washington, D.C., and will soon grow to cover the trees of the entire continental United States.

Small-leaved Elm (Small-Leaf Elm, Field Elm)

Ulmus minor

(Ulmus diversifolia, Ulmus carpinifolia)

February-March

An extremely variable tree, with many named variants, varying from widely spreading to almost fastigiate, occurring in hedgerows, wood margins and field-borders, rarely in woodland but often forming small copses. Lowland. They are weeds on acidic, nutrient-poor soils in South-East, Mid and Southwest England)

Flower

Flowers

Foliage

Form

Wych Elm

(Scots Elm)

Ulmus glabra

February-March

This is a largely non-suckering tree of hedges, field-borders and streamsides, but also forms mixed or pure woodland, especially on limestone and other base-rich soils. It is also a colonist of ungrazed grassland, rocky ground and waste and spoil heaps, and is also planted. Edible leaves.

Flower

Flowers

Juvenile Foliage from Queensdown Warren in Kent in May

Form

Tommy Cooper statements:-

Two  Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly.. They lit  a fire in the craft, it sank, proving once and for  all that you can't have your kayak and heat  it.