#5 PURPLE BEECH
Fagus sylvatica purpurea
Planted: 1924
This tree can be found at the northern end of the East Walk
| Distribution: | Widespread across Europe. A cultivated form of common beech, sometimes found in nature. |
| Planting Date: | 1924, purchased from Hillier Nurseries, Romsey, Hampshire. |
| Growth Habit: | Deep purple, distinctive, dramatic. Loved by some but loathed by others. You’ll often find this striking tree planted in landscape-scale gardens as a specimen tree. |
| Bark: | The bark is smooth, thin and grey, often with slight horizontal etchings. Twigs are slender and grey but not straight – their shape resembles a zig-zag. |
| Leaf: | Torpedo-shaped leaf buds are coppery and up to 2 cm in length, with a distinctive criss-cross pattern. Deep purple in the spring, turning to a coppery hue in the autumn, oval and fringed with silky brown hairs. |
| Flowers: | Monoecious – both male and female flowers grow on the same tree. In April and May the tassel-like male catkins hang from long stalks at the end of twigs, while female flowers grow in pairs, surrounded by a cup. |
| Fruit: | Once wind-pollinated, the cup becomes woody and encloses one or two reddish- brown beech nuts (known as beechmast). |
| Toxicity: | |
| Potential tree size | To 40 m |
| Uses: | Purple beech is planted in urban and rural areas across the UK as an ornamental tree for its distinctive purple leaves. It makes a good hedging plant, since it can be cut back hard. If clipped it doesn’t shed its leaves, and provides a year-round, dense screen which is a great habitat for garden birds. Like common beech, the timber can be used for a variety of purposes, including fuel, furniture, cooking utensils, tool handles and sports equipment. The wood burns well and was traditionally used to smoke herring. The edible nuts, or masts, were once used to feed pigs, and in France they are still sometimes roasted and used as a coffee substitute. |
| Plant Hunter: | Native |
| Introduction Date: | Native |
| Anecdotes and Comments: | ‘Copper Beech’ is an alternative common name. In Celtic mythology, Fagus was the god of beech trees. It was thought to have medicinal properties – beech leaves were used to relieve swellings in a poultice. |