poplar

[BEConklin]

Before frequenting this site, "poplar" to me, meant one of two trees:
- Tulip poplar, Liriodendron tulipifera which is often a HUGE tree with a straight tall trunk and not a single branch for the first 60 feet or more....but which is a member of the magnolia family, not the poplar family...
- and Lombardy poplar, Populus nigra which is an introduced ornamental that people used to plant for wind and privacy screen ...but which few people plant anymore in New England. They grow wicked fast, like 6 feet a year, and stay skinny and get very tall tall, then slowly start dying and looking uglier and uglier for years on end before someone takes an axe and puts them out of their misery.

I think a lot of people in different parts of the country use the name poplar for aspens as well.

 

[BEConklin]

Tulip poplars are cool trees. They were the trees that Native Americans preferred for making dugout canoes because they were so big and easy to carve and the wood doesn't shrink and crack that much. I've got some monster Tulip trees growing in the woods on and near my property. ...easily the largest trees out there.

 

[Mag Craft]

There are a lot of old cottonwood trees around Cheyenne easily 40" across the trunk.