Huge Wisteria or Purple Sycamore?!

[James Parton]

ENTS,

Some of you may remember a post on a huge vine I measured in downtown Hendersonville a little over a year ago. I guessed it to be a Wisteria but I was not sure. All I know is it is the biggest vine(s) I have seen. They encircle an American Sycamore which I later measured to be just under 100 feet tall. I noticed Wisteria being in bloom around town and remembered the huge vine. As I drove through town to the appropriate spot I thought " WoW, a purple blooming sycamore " The tree is beautiful draped in hanging purple flowers almost all the way to the top. I knew right then that the id on Wisteria was correct. I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking!

http://www.nativetreesociety.org/fieldt ... nville.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisteria

James

[edfrank]

James,

Yep, sure looks like a wisteria.  What an enormous vine.  I wonder hw old it might be?  Did you talk to the homeowner about the vine/

Ed

[James Parton]

Ed,

It is in front of a business. But, yes I would be curious of the vines age. Behind a huge grapevine measured by Jess Riddle it is the biggest vine I have seen in ENTS database.

James

[RyanLeClair]

There's an interesting vine at a park I like to visit.  When I was young my dad always used to bring me past it.  It didn't look to healthy last time, but that was a while ago, memory may not be willing.  Anyways, I'll post a photo of it.  Probably a record breaker, but it's still neat.

[James Parton]

Do you remember or have any idea what species it is?

JP

[RyanLeClair]

I don't know, but here is the photo.  It's not a very good photo, though, at least for getting a sense of size.  
The vine goes right from the ground to the canopy of the tree, a distance of probably 80+ feet.  I'll take some better photos soon.

[James Parton]

Judging by the dark color of the vine I would guess it to be some kind of grape. Maybe Muscadine.

James

[gnmcmartin]

When I was a boy--ages 5 through about 12--we had a wisteria vine growing up the side of our house. Next to the house we had a very tall cottonwood tree, and the vine bridged its way across to the tree and grew a good way up.  In the spring the color and fragrance of those wisteria blooms was wonderful. And I loved the fuzzy seed pods.

  Later we had the vine removed.  It was too hard to control and pried its way into places that it shouldn’t be.  The vine was very thick at the base--six inches at least, probably more. I have always loved wisteria, and have thought about planting one here.  But first I need to decide what kind of structure I can put in for it to grow on. In art session in the third or fourth grade I drew a picture of a "wisteria tree" and it was put up in our class art show for the parents to come see.

  --Gaines

[RyanLeClair]

Ok, grape would make sense, there are lots of grape vines to be found in these parts.