Zone 5a New England.

My plant id app says American Witchhazel. Not sure if thats correct, but maybe

Thanks, Dedtired.

Guess that’s not it. I dont see any bottles

And the leaf is close, not the same. the leaf of AWH is below. more oval than round. we have witch hazel in the nearby woods.

Thanks for your help.

Mulberry?

If it is any help those marks on the trunk are called lenticels.

Where is it growing in the world? Are all the leaves that big? ie 6”?

Thanks sweet Betsy, but I don’t think the shape is quite right. I’m not sure of the term but this seems to be a double toothed margin.

I think mulberry leaves are soft compared to the leaves of this tree. I once had a white mulberry tree outside my apartment. But the red mulberry leaves are different more like you’re indicating. I don’t think it’s quite right though.

Thanks Patricia, “If it is any help those marks on the trunk are called lenticels.”

I was trying to recall what those horizontal markings were called.

Floral, I am in southern New England, zone 5a. I think maybe the tree is about 8 foot or more and only three years or so old. It really shut up. I’d like to identify it before I think about ripping it out. My location is surrounded by deciduous woods in wetlands an area gets about six or seven hours of sun per day during the summer. We are on a northern slope surrounded by a lot of woods, so our home is in a clearing.

Someone uphill planted a catalpa tree. But I don’t think the leaves fit. Now that it’s December, I will have to wait until July to check out that or look online but I don’t think it’s a catalpa. And the catalpa they planted I don’t think it’s reached maturity enough to have any viable seed.

Typically the trees around us, the native ones, include: red Oak, red Maple, American beach, paper birch, yellow Birch, gray birch, Ash, sassafras, hemlock, white pine.

Some of the leaves lower down were likely smaller. Leaf shape is rounded overall.

Any hazels around? It’s not a Catalpa.

Thanks, Ded. I like the fragrance.

There are some things about the Grey Alder that would fit, but the leaf shape isn’t correct (?) unless the leaves of the top were an aberration.

Grey Alder Leaf:

The leaf margin type is “double serrate.”

I used to have 2 hazelnut trees and those leaves and bark look very similar.

Thanks Vgkg. Interesting; the leaves do look similar. I actually have a patch of hazelnuts in a couple of years ago I was trying to figure out what they were and took some photos around May of the stems and catkins. I was intending to transplant them because they’re up against a transplanted from somebody else’s property (with permission ;-)

In the photos but I’m going to include you can see though that the hazelnut Stems do not have lenticels. They have some other markings (get Patrizia back here).

Let’s bring I was going to transplant these hazelnuts but like it on the way. I’m not saying I can just dig them up and put them someplace where the chipmunks won’t grab every nut.

I look online at a couple of blocks that had good photos. And I’ll include one. I’ll try to find the name of her blog. Actually they were two blogs

I’m trying to type with my voice and my machine is out of memory so I hope you can figure out what I’m trying to write.

This single sapling is much taller than the hazelnut stems.

My photo of clump of hazelnut plants that came with a transplated Hawthorn.

My photo of clump of hazelnut plants that came with a transplated Hawthorn.

American hazelnut because the immature fruit (months later) looked like that in the photo below:

(not petalique’s photo)

This bunch of C. americana is about 40 feet from the sapling I want to ID.

So, it looks like my mystery sapling is likely an American hazelnut. That’s good.

Thanks, everyone.

Here is the blogger w Hazelnut plants and photos of leaves:

https://ouroneacrefarm.com/2013/09/03/hazelnuts/

Edit— info and photo added.

Hazel bark is variable. It can have pronounced horizontal lenticels and can even be confused with cherry. http://dendro.cnre.vt.edu/dendrology/syllabus/factsheet.cfm?ID=964 It can also grow tall if left uncoppiced. Twenty feet easily.

Thank you, floral.

That would be good if it’s a hazelnut. I can’t wait for spring now and the solstice hasn’t passed. Hurry up spring.

When I was looking at the hazelnuts a couple years ago and I came across somebody’s blog about beaked hazelnut, I swore I took a lot more photos than I can find. And I thought I observe that very pronounced red hair looking growth* in the spring. Maybe they’re on my desk somewhere. But that was of the hazelnut patch that I posted at kitchen table Next to the Hawthorn that we transplanted. Who knows maybe that bunch of hazelnut stems did produce some viable nuts in a chipmunk transplanted them for me. Those chipmunks owe me, I could call it even.

* Can you tell me what that dark red hairy flower part is called?

GOT it— red stigma and styles protruding from the otherwise gray-brown buds

Witch Hazel and hazelnuts are not related. The leaves of hazelnuts can be anything from medium to fairly large and are thinish and are double toothed but they usually have a little pointy tip. I got up to look at the clump outside the back room window (we have a ton of Hazelnut and they are grown commercially around here) They do grow in a clump unless pruned to a single stem. I cant see any lenticels. Mine are covered with catkins-those dangly things that pollinate the inconspicuous flowers.

Definitely not Catalpa which have the most amazing flowers by the way.

Thanks.

Yes, I understand witch hazel isn’t related to hazelnut. I have both plants.

So, it looks like my mystery sapling is likely an American hazelnut. That’s good.

Thanks, everyone.

petalique, above I said that I used to have 2 Hazelnut trees because after 10 years of poor production I removed them. Only 1 year did we get a good harvest of nuts, other years nut shells formed but they were empty/hollow on the inside. On top of the nutless disappointments the Hazelnut leaves are a Japanese Beetle magnet and they'd tear through the trees every year skeletonizing most of the leaves. I don't recall both varieties of trees but one of them was Barcelona.

Thanks, vgkg. I will adjust my expectations.