I just stumbled across some information that led me to learn that our sweetgum or liquidambar trees are related to the witch hazel, belonging to the same botanical family. If you are looking for an alternative to the witch hazel study, you might look in your area for a sweetgum tree to observe up close instead. Right now they are very easy to spot with their beautiful autumn colored leaves.
Our trees are beginning to form the sticker balls and are bright green. This are actually the fruits of the tree and will dangle down like little tree ornaments, turning brown as the season progresses. The information we found about the fruits says that each prickly point will eventually open up to release two winged seeds. We are going to watch and see if we can find those seeds this year!The leaves have five pointy lobes and a long stem.
The leaves of the tree have a nice aroma.
The sweetgum is native to many parts of the United States and you can see a map here on USDA.
I think the fruits of sweetgum are awesome replicas of maces — fun nature study connection to medieval history studies!
For HS homeschoolers: As they always do in botany, they’ve reclassified sweetgum into a new family with only three genera: “It is currently classified in the plant family Altingiaceae, but was formerly considered a member of the Hamamelidaceae.” {Cafferty, Steve. “Taxonomy”. Encyclopedia of Life. Natural History Museum.} With older students, this is a great opportunity to talk about how taxonomy is not an exact science, because the more we learn about things, the more we realize we DON’T know!