Liquidambar
The liquidambar is a kind of Arbre S with null and void sheets of the family of the Hamamélidacée S made up of four Espèces:
-
Liquidambar acalycina - originating in China
- Liquidambar formosana - originating in Formosa
- Liquidambar orientalis Miller - originating in Minor Asia and with sheets smaller than the styraciflua
- Liquidambar styraciflua L. or Copalme in America, species Monoïque originating in the east of the North America, more particularly of Florida.
Description
The liquidambar was introduced in 1681 in Europe where it is very widespread today. It is a tree developing naturally in the shape of narrow pyramid. The trunk is usually right and is not divided into multiple trunks but it strongly has tendency to Drageon ner.The bark becomes deeply striated.
The foliage of the liquidambar, often confused with that of the maple, is very decorative and takes beautiful colors red crimson in autumn. The sheets release a balsamic odor when one them ruffled.
Its flowers appear in the month of May but are rather frost-susceptible late. The Inflorescence S are globulous of color green-yellow. Similar to small golf balls, the fruits, laid out in Racème, are spherical capsule S with spines containing from 10 to 60 winged seeds according to the variety and the conditions of culture. When they become mature, they pass from the green apple to the beige but one can collect the capsule at the beginning of autumn when it is still green in order to recover easily seeds later a few weeks. If they are not collected, the fruits, emptied their seeds by the wind or the birds, remain on the tree all the winter. A tree produces seeds each year from 20 to 150 years but one generally notes a more abundant production once every three years.
The liquidambar can reach thirty to forty meters height, a trunk one meter in diameter at the base, and a longevity from 200 to 300 years.
Liquid amber
Also called Copalme of America , American Styrax (although the liquidambar does not have any bond with the styrax kind) or to drown glossed , the liquidambar (of Latin liquidus and Arabic ambar for " Amber liquide") its name with the liquid amber owes which it produces. It is about a resin with the odor of grooves called " styrax" .The resin of Liquidambar was used in Egypt 3000 years before J. - C. by the embalmers and it is always used today in Parfumerie under the name of " Balsam of liquidambar" or of the Peru. In 1786, an English scientist with the idea to distill the resin of Liquidambar and in extract a baptized oil Styrax. One then uses it out of infusion as stimulant of the respiratory tracts, anti-diarrheal and anti-stresses. With the the United States, the Cherokee used the resin of liquidambar like chewing-gum.
At the 19th century, French chemists manage to isolate the molecule from Styrène starting from Styrax and to synthesize it in laboratory. In 1925, a German chemist makes a success of the assembly of several molecules of styrene and… the " baptizes it; Polystyrene " !
Culture
It is a tree of easy culture not very sensitive to the diseases.Its speed of growth is fast for the styraciflua, slower for the Eastern species.
Varieties
The Cultivar Liquidambar styraciflua “Rotundiloba” is sterile and thus produces never capsules filled with seeds.This cultivar was created in the USA in the Eighties to prevent that the carparks of the shopping malls (or one often plants it) are not returned slipping by these balls each autumn
External bonds
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