Tree Talk: American Sycamore 

An adult sycamore is by far one of the most beautiful and imposing trees. Second only to a white oak.

I have two of these in my front yard! I live in a 50s era midwest urban subdivision. The builder or original owners all planted sycamores up and down the street, the effect is quite beautiful. Yes, the leaves are a beast to clean up in the fall but they're perfect for grinding in the mulching mower, bagging and spreading around the shrub beds. The seed puffs make me sneeze and this year was a major bark shedding event, my entire front yard covered deeply in strips of bark, also great mulch! After all is said I'm looking out my front windows now and see that beautiful mottled bark, 2 squirrels have their heads popped out of a knot in the trunk, well I wouldn't give them up for anything!

Another cool fact; they have been around for 100 million years.

Awesome you did sycamores!! I love sycamore trees!!

My ggggggg grandfather lived in a giant Sycamore when he settled in Marlinton,West Virginia in 1732. His name was Jacob Marlin

I did not know I needed to watch this video at 6;30 am 6/3/24 untill it came acrossed my recommendations. Thank you 😅

Got a young one of these from a local native plants nursery and love it (we have heavy clay soil) ... sadly the power company came in and one guy walking past it topped it even though it was only 8ft tall and 25ft away from the power line (I could have understood it had it been taller or closer to the power line). Thankfully it now has a new leader.

Sycamore is one of my favorites. We bought land on a river in Ohio and have MASSIVE sycamores. I've spend 3 years clearing invasive species by hand and now I'm learning all I can about the native tree species. So far I have every tree you've covered. Osage Orange should be on your list to cover soon!

If you could talk about Sycamores all day, please do, brother, I’ll be eager to hear it! That was very helpful and interesting. We are so lucky to have this free educational resource available to us on RU-vid. I work for a big power plant and we have some woods on our property where the sycamore trees have blown their seeds to the edge of our lake, where we get our cooling water from, and our managers usually have them cut down every year, but after watching this I am thinking we should opt to keep them as they could filter the water and help to cool the water through their great big canopies. This year I asked her if I could get the saplings and take them home and she was okay with that. I’m hoping to go tomorrow and uproot the 5 or 6 saplings I see and move them over near my house which is near an oxbow lake on the Kaskaskia river. Thank you for sharing that information about how much water they can move. We have issues with flooding sometimes and this oxbow lake is where the nearby cities get their drinking water from so cleaning it up some would be fantastic. May God bless you, sir, you have blessed us all. Peace

Thought you were going to say, “I love big tree and cannot lie” 😊 BrrrmpBump! 😁 Loved your presentation!

I have buttonwoods out front of my house in an older development built around 1951-2. They are rather messy with the leaves, bark, seeds, pollen etc. But they are protected by the Boro because the street name is Buttonwood! I learned something from you today! I knew that they are Sycamores, Plane Trees, and Buttonwoods but did not know that the name comes from the fact that the wood was good for making buttons! Interesting! Another great fact about these hardy trees! Thank you!

This was great thanks! Our neighbor's parkway tree is a sycamore. And man.... Those seeds are PLENTIFUL and they get EVERYWHERE!!!! All over our yards, stuck along the grass and IN OUR CARS!!!! We've lived here for 12 years but for some reason never really noticed it until this year. It never seemed to be this bad. Wonder why that is! But anyway, can't help but love how excited you get about sycamore trees! Thanks for the lesson!!

That's great info, thanks so much. I live in North Eastern Ontario, and will look into planting some sycamore on our property, they seem well suited to the conditions here, and since they grow fast maybe I can enjoy their crown before I'm down there with their roots :)

Identity of this tree is awesome and extra knowledge about the seeds and fruits and buds. It's awesome

This is my new favorite channel. So much great information packed into the Tree Talk series!

I appreciate this show so very much.

just an FYI I picked you video cause of your beagle 🐶🐶 love your doggie also good info on the tree thanks 👍👍

Subscribed 10 seconds in. This is gold!

Love your videos buddy

I have been teaching children ...and adults ... about the natural world around us...in southeastern PA and Northwestern DE for many years...at established places of learning...recently I have come across your channel ...I am happy to find an excellent resource of information there. Thank You

Sycamore is my favorite tree. They are absolutely gorgeous lining streets. Nothing else looks like them

Nice! That's great information. Thank you.

Learned a lot! My neighbors (on either side) have Sycamores (3 total) and I always get the leaves and the fuzzy hairs/seeds in my yard. They accumulate around my flower beds. I always thought the fuzzy bits WERE the seed, but now I know better. Those little sharp seeds always stick in my foot. Now I know where all that stuff comes from and what its function is. Cool! Thanks so much! New subscriber here....I love trees, but don't know nearly enough about any of them.

Great presentation I have added a few species to my garden. Thank you, very much appreciated.

Thanks, your video made me excited for sycamore trees! We want to plant trees in our yard, and happened to have noticed a couple of sycamore tree saplings that somehow started close to the house (surely that aerial seed dispersion you mentioned), so we will replant them in selected areas of our yard where we want shade trees. Nice to know that they are fast growing.

I became a fan of the sycamore family when I resettled at 3,000ft in the mtns of Brazil, about 20 years ago and saw eastern and London plane trees which had been brought down here by the royal family 200 yrs ago. Unfortunately most of the south and southeast of the country is prone to 3 types of mistletoe parasites, of which one is so aggressive that it ends up killing the trees that are not cared for. I wanted to surround my house in them for fall foliage and their bare white trunks which would guarantee full winter sun, as well as to have a blast peeling off the bark and kicking through the accumulated dry leaves, but didn´t know how I´d maintain so many. So I decided to use the infested branches for firewood and soon discovered their building properties as floor joists and columns. My latest project has been to plant them practically on the river bed beside my land, away from the strongest currents, and so far they´ve proven to be well suited...one day my river will be unique in Brazil! Anyway, 3 years ago, while visiting NYC I brought sycamore seeds back and they´re growing vigorously and showing beautiful pink and red tones. In a few years I can try to make hybrids between the 3 types, find the most colorful autumn foliage and the ones which are most resistant to the parasite and just have fun discovering the wonderful world of the Platanus! Thanks for your video, I´m constantly searching for more information regarding this family.

Francis andre muechex measured one on the bank of the Ohio River 48ft circumfrence in CT where I live we have the pinchot sycamore measures 28ft circumference 500yr old beauty her odd shape kept her alive next to Farmington river aomerhing that old living is just so amazing happy earth day homie

One of my favourite trees . Thanks for this!

I'm a Woodturner and have just discovered the sycamore. Good videos! Thanks.

This was a wonderful video. I'd been wondering which tree had such humongous leaves! And it's indeed the sycamore. Wow, what a great tree to know about. My hiking pals and I see these hollowed out trees so frequently whilst walking, now I guess I know what they're called. Unless, other varieties also do that trick. They always remind us of fairy quarters or some little critter's den.

Man that is a head full of gorgeous locks 😂 liking the mane! And cool tree too I guess

Great video, I've learned so much from your channel. Thank you. Could you do a video about the advantages of different kinds of bark? Some trees have very smooth bark, some very shaggy, some very soft, and some quite hard. It'd be interesting to learn why they evolved all these different ways

Just discovered your channel! I love it!

Thanks for a great video.

Thank you for saving the forests 🙏🏻

In Ryan's defense, 10,000 seeds a year for 200-600 years is a couple million per tree on the conservative side.

Thank you very much! Wonderful video!!!

Wow beautiful ❤️🥰 perfect

It’s exciting to see someone as excited about Sycamore trees as I am ❤. In my hometown there are hundreds of gigantic sycamore trees in a flood plain near the river and they are so beautiful in the wintertime. Out of curiosity, why do some have leaves with fewer teeth and more pronounced arcs while others have leaves that have more ridges and teeth? I know that London Planes have a more “maple-like” leaf shape that tend to be a little fuzzier, but especially around the Pittsburgh area the leaves of the sycamores near the river seem to be sharper with more pronounced arcs (if that makes sense). Meanwhile in NY and Virginia the leaves seem to have a lot more teeth dispersed across the leaves and are rounder. Just thought I’d see if you have any opinion on this!

Great video. My favorite tree is a sycamore also but I love the ones with white bark. Having been from California to California Sycamore is really beautiful and unfortunately they tend to hybridize with the London plain tree and get that same grayish kind of bark, which just isn’t as vibrant and pretty along the Creeks as the white bark in my opinion.

Maybe they're referred to as plane trees bc we're on a plane:)

I was really interested in the sycamore because I’ve noticed for example, this year, when all the other trees had leaves on them, the sycamore did not, and I was afraid that they were all diseased, but several months later I look at them, and they are completely filled with foliage. Does the sycamore produce leaves later than other trees?

A sycamore that was 14' in diameter? Thats as thick as a redwood tree

Hey Ryan. What would your opinion of using young sycamore shoots (6-8 foot straight rods) for bent wood furniture making. I'm thinking these might be a good candidate for annual coppicing as they are such fast growers. There is a lot of open land in the flood plain where I live (Asheville area) and I'm considering giving these a go. Love to hear your opinion

Can you please help me? Dug a pond a couple years ago. The water level is roughly 20 feet away from a sycamore but ever since the pond was dug the sycamore seems to be stressed, there is a little bit of dirt that got piled up at the base of the tree that has since been removed, how do I determine if the water is stressing the tree or if it’s dirt? It is an older, bigger sycamore I’d say it’s roughly 80 to 90 feet tall probably 4 foot in diameter at the base.

I’m near Charlottesville and have lots of creeks I’d like to reestablish sycamores. Any source for larger than 2’ American sycamores with white camp bark?

Buddy, you sure it’s not a London plane tree with the two balls?

I enjoyed this very much...think I will plant a sycamore this spring..I have the seeds in the fridge just waiting for march....a Question....When do they start to hollow out? I would prefer to be dead by that time....thanks!