I HAVE THE INFO

Consider the Ginkgo Tree

Now that I have been post scooped by my wife, I guess I have finally been motivated to write my Gingko tree post.

For most of the summer, Stephanie and I have argued about the ginkgo. Ginkgo trees are everywhere in Philadelphia and the smell of their dropped, rotten, crushed underfoot fruits are ungodly and fetid. Until recently, Its been my humble opinion that they should all be unceremoniously ripped from the ground and turned into mulch and fire wood.

I had heard that the trees were bought by philadelphia city planners en masse because they were cheap. I wanted to get the whole story on this subject, ie who the genius was who thought this was a good idea and how he was publicaly flogged and run out of town after one summer of the fruits stinking up Washington square.

Googling “gingko tree” and Philadelphia led me to a Philly Blog Discussion on the topic of these vomit smell factories and their relationship to the city.

I found no such story about city planners and bad decisions. What I did find, kind of blew my mind:

“Dave” writes that:

The Ginkgo is on the Fairmount Park commission’s list of approved street trees because of their resistance to urban stresses like pollution, salt (for melting snow), and bad, compacted soil. Other trees on the “under wires” list are. They may have planted the females before they realized what a problem the fruit was. I think they’ve been making more of an effort in recent years to plan what kind of tree gets planted where rather than just buying whatever’s on sale at the nursery.

So probably, whoever decided on this tree, may not have realized what he was doing to the city smell wise. And/or he may have selected a species that would be pretty much perfect for any city, no matter how polluted it might be or become. Which brings me to the kind of mind blowing part:

Ginkgo Go Boom writes:

So here there are tons of interesting Ginkgo facts … living fossil, trees can live for 3,000 years blah blah blah, they still stink, but if you think you can just get rid of them think again ….

Hiroshima: A-bombed Ginkgo

At the end of World War II on August 6th 1945 an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima by the Americans. The plants and trees in the area around the epicentre were examined in September 1945.
The Ginkgo situated near a temple about 1.1 km away from the blast center appeared to bud after the blast without any major deformations (the temple itself was destroyed). The temple-site in Housenbou was smaller after the war and they considered transplanting or cutting down the Ginkgo to rebuild the temple. In 1994 it was decided to leave it there and adjust the temple to it, so now the main building has stairs in front divided into left-and right hand sides, protecting the Ginkgo inside this U-shape.
Engraved on it “No more Hiroshima” and people’s prayers for peace.

Four atomic bombed Ginkgo trees are still alive.

This quote itself is cut and pasted from this site which has a ton of history about gingko trees.

All of which makes me want to give a big ‘RESPECT’ to the Gingko trees I have previously wanted to see wiped off the cityscape.

They can survive atomic bombs. Any plant that can do that should have a fruit that smells like vomit.