Silver birch in Polissia
Betula pendula
Caution: pollen is a strong allergen in spring
The silver birch is a tree with white bark that becomes dark and fissured at the base of the trunk. Its thin branches hang down, and the young shoots are covered with resinous warts. The leaves are triangular-rhombic with a double-toothed edge.
In Polissia the birch grows almost everywhere: in mixed forests, on clearings, burnt areas, abandoned fields and the edges of bogs. It is one of the first to colonise open land and forms young birch woods that are later replaced by pine and oak.
In spring the birch flowers with long catkins, and its pollen causes allergies in many people. In spring a drink used to be made from birch sap, and birch bark was used for crafts.
Collecting birch sap in the forest without permission is not allowed, and wounds in the trunk harm the tree. Another, rare birch of Polissia is the shrubby birch, a small shrub of sphagnum bogs.
When to see: all year; flowers in April
Where it was seen in Polissia
Observations from the open scientific database GBIF since 1990.
More in “Plants”
Sosnowsky's hogweed
An invasive giant plant whose sap causes severe burns in sunlight; it is spreading in Polissia along roads and rivers.
Common juniper
A coniferous shrub of Polissia's pine forests with prickly needles and blue “berries” (berry-like cones).
Shrubby birch
A low shrub of the birch family that grows on Polissia's bogs; a rare remnant of the Ice Age flora.
Scots pine
The main tree of Polissia: pine forests on sand define the look of the region from Volyn to Chernihiv region.