Two-stem tulip trees are fairly common in Appalachian mixed mesophytic forests where tulip trees are dominant. Three-stem tulip trees are less common. But the rare four-stem tulip tree is a sight to behold.

Tulip trees (liriodendron tulipifera, a.k.a. tulip poplar, yellow poplar) are famous for their tall, straight trunks that may rise fifty feet into the canopy before the first branch appears on a tree that tops out at 100 to 150 feet. Even more spectacular are the co-dominant, multi-stem tulip trees, equally as branchless at lower levels but with more than one mature trunk reaching skyward. Single trunk dominance is the result of apical buds at the tip of the central leader stem that releases auxin hormones to prevent other branches from acting like trunks. Some trees, however, can develop multiple stems when they are young each with apical buds. This is especially common in stump sprouts. As the tree matures, codominant stems may fracture and fall, or be self-pruned by the tree. Two-stem tulip trees are fairly common in Appalachian mixed mesophytic forests where tulip trees are dominant. Three-stem tulip trees are less common. But the rare four-stem tulip tree is a sight to behold. There can be more than four codominant stems, but with five the tree becomes splayed, potentially compromising the structural integrity of the tree.    

Tulip trees are easily recognized by their unique four-lobed leaves. There are approximately 500 species of oak trees with many different leaf shapes, but there are only two species of tulip trees with leaves shaped like no other tree on the planet. Liriodendron tulipifera lives in the Eastern Deciduous Forest of North America, and liriodendron chinense lives in a similar biome covering the temperate and subtropical deciduous forests of eastern China. The “tulip” part of the tree’s name comes from the large, tulip-like flowers that cover the canopy in June, the nectar of which is a bee, butterfly, and hummingbird favorite. Successfully pollinated, the flower becomes a packet of samara seeds dispersed by the wind throughout the fall and winter.

I found my first four-trunk tulip tree in the White’s Woods Nature Center on the edge of Indiana, Pennsylvania, during my year-long observation for the book, Near Woods; A Year in an Allegheny Forest. The book is a celebration of small, forested areas found on the edge of many communities where people first learn about nature and their own connections to it over the course of their lives and the life of the community itself.

For nearly a century that included timbering, quarrying, coal mining, natural gas drilling, periodic fires, and community frolics, Quad Trunk Tulip Tree grew on an overlooked patch of Overlook Hill. The natural wonder graces the cover of the book. I thought it was the only four-stem tulip tree in the 500-acre tract of woods that includes the adjacent Indiana University of Pennsylvania Coop Park. It wasn’t. I discovered a second quad-trunk tulip tree in a recent exploration of a remote section of the woods called the Fleming Run Ravines. This hilly terrain of trees is more often visited by deer and bears than people, and includes a beech forest, tamarack grove, and several examples of codominant tulip trees with two and three stems; and one with four. It is not easy to access the narrow “V” of a two-stem tree, but the view skyward from inside the basal hub of a four-trunk tulip tree is one of the marvels to be found in Indiana, Pennsylvania’s near-woods.

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