Mystery trees blooming in the north forest gully
Both trees are about 20 feet tall and what I'd characterize as skinny. One of them is fairly straight, the other curves out into the area now getting more sun since the big trees fell. DBH of both is 4 inches.
One tree is higher on the slope of the north side of the 6.3-TheGulch and is straight and tall, probably 30 feet, with all the flowers and greenery up top. The other is on the south, very close to the bottom of the gulch and it goes up about 10 feet and then curves another 15 feet or so horizontally across the gulch. Both have DBH of 4 inches
There turned out to be a third one I hadn't noticed the first time which is up on top of the slight ridge between the forest gully and the upper pond areas. It is also straight and tall with flowering and leaves only going on up top. DBH 3.7 inches
These are trees, not a thicket like the wild plum a few hundred feet away.
The flowers and leaves are not like the invasive pear whose flowers appear well before the leaves and are pretty much gone when it begins to leaf out. Also the bark and branching pattern are not very similar. The pear have darker and smoother bark and much more branching lower down the trunk. On the right is the mystery tree, on the left is invasive pear. (When I first found these and tried to ID them, I came up with Asian pear partly because of the shape and coloring and taste and texture of the inch to inch and a half fruits. I'm sure now that they are indeed the bad guys, even if very popular with the insects.)
Pear on left, unknown on right
unknown has much lighter flower center and more like a stem at the base of the petals and toothed leaves.
6.3.4>NorthForestGully.TheGulch>Pair white flowers mystery
simple leaf, toothed, clustered on end of stalk
6.3.4>NorthForestGully.TheGulch>Pair white flowers mystery
Trunk is plated and mostly smooth; sucker coming out low on trunk appears to have opposite leaf pattern rather than clusters seen on the main tree.
6.3.4>NorthForestGully.TheGulch>Pair white flowers mystery
Younger branches smooth grey bark, with opposite twig branching.
6.3.4>NorthForestGully.TheGulch>Pair white flowers mystery
Sweet smelling white flower with five petals. Tiny hints of red is some of the petals.
North Forest Gully from the south
Early spring: bush honeysuckle invaders greened out; and some mystery white flowering trees now visible, 3 of them. The yellow leaves are from a huge wintercreeper vine that I cut a month ago. Several largish trees have come down this past winter, opening up light into the bottom of the gully.
Very large photo of the whole tree
This is a vertical panorama that shows the whole tree in detail at 100% resolution. Not as much detail on the flowers as I'd like, but enough to see it is the same as the other two blooming now. You can view the full size image by going to the size icon in the lower right corner.