Ginkgo biloba is in no danger of extinction; the fruits are an
important COMMERCIAL nut WIDELY used in Chinese cooking, the leaves
are used WORLDWIDE in MANY POPULAR MEDICINES, and BOTH sexes are
common as street trees.
kwantenzap at xs4all.nl (CorK) writes:
>Where did you observe street trees?
Female specimens of Ginkgo biloba with which I am well acquainted,
having stepped on their smelly rotting fruits:
New Haven, CT: Sachem Street; also along Chapel Street (downtown)
Cambridge, MA: Harvard, outside the Museum of Comparative Zoology
Manhattan, NY: Upper West Side, along Broadway
In New Haven, there is also a solitary specimen in Wooster Park. I
don't know its sex: it has produced no fruits that I have seen, but
that doesn't mean it is male. Apart from this specimen, all Ginkgo
trees I know of are planted in mixed-sex or all-female populations.
--
Una Smith una.smith at yale.edu
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Yale University
