A Tree Fit for a Queen

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Paulownia blossoms. (Marilyn Wood, Photo/Nats)

Margie Gibson

NZP Staff Writer

ZOOGOER

May-June 1993

Some years ago, after a trip to Egypt, a vision of jacaranda trees clothed in lavender-colored blossoms against a backdrop of the Giza pyramids remained in my mind as a memento of that ancient land. Several weeks after returning to Washington, then awash in the blooms of spring, I was amazed to see what I thought was a jacaranda growing practically in my own backyard-on the Zoo's grounds in a fenced-off area in the blesbok yard.

The tall, ivy-clad tree was covered with wisterialike clusters of blossoms. The leaves had not yet appeared and the lavender shades of the blooms contrasted with the deep blue of the spring sky. The ground beneath was blanketed with its fallen flowers-trumpetlike blossoms tinged buttery yellow inside.

It seemed odd that a tree able to survive Egypt's arid heat could successfully emigrate and establish itself in Washington's temperate climate. As it turned out, the tree in question was definitely not a jacaranda with African and Middle Eastern connections, but a paulownia, rooted in the civilizations of China and Japan.

And the tree in the blesbok yard was not a lonely specimen. Other paulownias were growing in what is now the tapir yard at the Zoo's Connecticut Avenue entrance, near the giant kingfisher's yard at the Bird House, and on the hillside descending toward Rock Creek bordering on Parking Lot A. They were also growing in Rock Creek-several are easily spotted when they are in bloom, usually in May, from the bridges that cross the Park near the intersection of Connecticut Avenue and Calvert Street.

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Area paulownias generally bloom in May. (Virginia Twinam-Smith, Phot/Nats)

It appeared that these trees grow prolifically throughout the region. And, not only are there a lot of them, they have a long history that weaves through Asia, Europe, and North America.

A Chinese encyclopedia of natural and cultural objects, the Erh-ya, contains the earliest written record of the paulownia. The encyclopedia, usually attributed to Chou Kung, duke of Chou and the son of the first ruler of the Chou Dynasty, appeared around 1000 B.C. It is the only known record of the prehistoric Chinese lore of natural history. The encyclopedia contains a reference that praises the beauty and utility of the "glorious paulownia wood."

According to Chinese legend, the tree was an omen of good fortune because of its association with the phoenix, a mythical bird that regenerated itself in fire. The phoenix must have been as picky as a pampered cat of today, because it would alight in only the very choicest of paulownia trees and appear only when a benevolent ruler was in power. The paulownia thus was cultivated extensively to encourage the appearance of the phoenix.

In China, uncultivated paulownias grow only in very remote temperate regions, primarily in open, marginal areas of forests, where they share habitat with such "living fossil" trees as the ginkgo and metasequoia (which can be seen in the Zoo's Beaver Valley). In the past, these regions were also home to isolated communities of Taoist and Buddhist monks, whose members were well versed in the natural history of their surroundings.

Centuries ago, a monk carved a fish from the wood of a paulownia. The carving, which produced a deep, thunderlike sound when struck with a stick, was hung just inside a temple gate and used as a bell. Today, a fish-shaped paulownia bell still is used in many Buddhist monasteries to summon the monks.

The paulownia has continued to hold special meaning for the Chinese even into recent times. Before Mao Tsetung came to power, Chinese intellectuals gathered for companionship in groves of paulownias. An educated Chinese aspired to become chun-tzu, a man of complete virtue. Because the living paulownia has soft, brittle wood that becomes hard and strong after it is cut, the Chinese considered the tree to have a tender heart and steady character, the very essence of chun-tzu.

Today, the tree's bark, wood, flowers, fruits, and leaves still are used in traditional Chinese medicine to promote growth of hair, darken graying hair, reduce swelling in the feet, heal bruises, and treat patients suffering from hallucinations and delirium.

From China, the paulownia was introduced to Japan, where it became an important part of another ancient culture. A manuscript dating to 1049 A.D. notes that paulownia wood readily survives repeated drying and soaking, and lasts longer than pine, fir, or oak. These qualities made it suitable for use as beams and pillars in houses and for making coffins. The wood found its way into a number of other objects as well: geta, or wooden clogs, furniture, ornamental carvings, wooden bowls and spoons, bas-relief panels, and, because the wood is so resonant, the koto, a long zitherlike musical instrument with 13 silk strings.

The paulownia became so revered in Japan that its leaves and flowers were incorporated into the Order of the Paulownia Sun, established in 1888 by Emperor Meiji. The honor is bestowed on those who have demonstrated outstanding civil or military merit. Generally awarded to high-ranking diplomats, generals, and admirals, and the highest honor Japan can bestow on a foreigner, it was presented to General Douglas MacArthur in 1960.

Perhaps the best example of Japanese respect for the paulownia, however, is the tree's link to the ritual of marriage. On the occasion of the birth of a daughter, the father would plant a paulownia. The tree grows quickly-as much as 16 feet a year-and by the end of a decade can reach a height of 40 feet. When the daughter was betrothed, the paulownia was felled and the lumber used to make a tansu, or dowry chest. The tradition thrived until the 1970s, when a blight wiped out the Japanese paulownias.

In 1972, a Japanese walnut-log buyer happened to find what looked like paulownia growing along Virginia's Skyline Drive. He took samples of the wood, flowers, and leaves back to Japan for analysis and discovered that the American tree was just as good as Japanese paulownias. A lucrative new export industry sprang up overnight. High quality lumber from a single mature tree can bring as much as $20,000 from Japanese customers.

In West Virginia, where the tree thrives on land reclaimed from strip mining, the nonprofit Panhandle Paulownia Club, Ltd., leases land at a rate of one dollar per acre per year to families who commit to planting and caring for paulownias. Profits from sales of mature trees go toward education for the children of these families.

Unfortunately, the trees have also attracted the attention of "paulownia poachers," who cut mature specimens in an attempt to earn easy money. As recently as February, several trees mysteriously disappeared in the Washington area. However, wild-growing trees are rarely of high-enough quality for export. The Zoo's paulownias, for example, are all uncultivated and unsuitable for commercial use.

Westerners first learned about the paulownia when Swedish botanist Karl P. Thunberg documented it on a visit to Japan in the 1770s. It was named in honor of Anna Paulovna, the granddaughter of Catherine the Great and wife of Willem II, king of the Netherlands from 1840 to 1849. From its association with her, the paulownia also gets its popular name, the princess, or empress, tree.

By the 1830s, the porcelain trade brought regular contact between Asia and the United States, which was probably how the paulownia spread to this continent. In the days before packing "peanuts" and plastic sheets of air bubbles, paulownia seed pods served as packing material for shipments of delicate porcelain to the United States. When the pods were discarded, the trees sprouted throughout the East, especially along the banks of the Hudson, Schuylkill, and Brandywine Rivers.

These introduced trees were popular exotics in their early years and were written about in horticultural and botanical magazines of the time. A brisk trade in paulownia seedlings soon developed. However, by 1847, people had learned that the tree could be propagated by root cuttings as well, and the demand for seedlings dropped precipitously. Although the paulownia became widespread along the East Coast within 20 years of its arrival, its messy seed pods and lack of color in the fall discouraged horticulturists from using it more frequently in cultivated garden settings.

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Paulownia tree in bloom. (Philip Beauline, Photo/Nats)

Today the paulownia is found mostly as a wild-growing tree throughout the mid-Atlantic and southeastern United States, often along state and federal highways in the first decade after construction. When not in bloom, the paulownia is easily recognized during the summer by the enormous size of its leaves, which provide deep shade even on the brightest days.

By fall, after the leaves drop, the large seed pods make the tree readily identifiable. The pods break open and release their winged seeds, which are carried by the breeze to nearby locations where they germinate. A single pod contains as many as 1,500 seeds, and a large tree can produce 20,000,000 seeds-more than 14 pounds-each year. The dried pods remain on the tree throughout the winter. The rustling sound of wind blowing through the pods gives the paulownia another of its common names, the rattlebox tree.

Biologist Peter Beckjord believes that, in the United States and in developing countries where land has been damaged by poor agricultural and industrial practices, paulownia trees may be an ideal solution for land reclamation. Because the paulownia regenerates quickly from roots, it is able to survive fires (perhaps one of the reasons it was associated with the phoenix) and thrive in marginal conditions.

And, according to Beckjord, the species paves the way for, rather than competes with, successive growth of other, more desirable trees. By the time a paulownia reaches the flowering stage-after eight to ten years-other trees and shrubs have had a chance to become established in the area. Paulownia seeds cannot penetrate the debris on the forest floor to sprout and take root, allowing other species to take over.

And what of the lovely Egyptian jacaranda trees, so evocative of pharaohs and pyramids, that provided the inspiration for my "paulownia odyssey"? Turns out they are distant relatives of the paulownia, but they are not African or Middle Eastern natives: Jacarandas are indigenous to the dry, tropical regions of the Americas!