Common Beech

The western giant of mature, dark woods

If people ceased mowing, pruning and felling much of Europe would be covered in forest: dense, dark forests with tall trees and a closed canopy and the common beech would be one of the most important components.

These trees can reach up to 46 m high, have thick straight trunks with silvery bark that support a dense crown of small green, serrated leaves. In the autumn the tree sheds its leaves yet in the spring and summer there are so many leaves that not enough sunlight is able to penetrate and allow other plants to grow on the ground beneath them. Occasionally a beech will fall and in the clearing around the tree there is a risk of plants becoming sunburnt by the sudden increase in light intensity.

There is only one common beech species, all the other beeches - the copper beech, weeping beech, fern-leaved beech, Dawyck beech and twisted beech - are descended from just a few individuals, all variants of the common beech.

The beech is an unmistakable tree with smooth grey bark that prefers to grow on humus-rich, not too moist yet well-drained soil. Beech can attain 200 to 300 years in age. Young beech trees are often planted in hedges since they hold on to their dead leaves until late April. The smooth bark of the beech has, through the ages, often played the role as witness to a variety of events and bear notches in the declaration of love.

Beech can be found across most of Europe up to 60^o north, although in the south it only grows in mountain regions. The finest beech forests grow in Germany on calcareous soils of the Swabian Jura and the Franconian Jura. Here the beech can reach 45 m height and 300 years old although the average age is between 140-160 years. The variegated common beech will remain smaller in stature, and longevity is dependent on many factors.

The beech is well adapted to the northern European maritime climate with its cool but not too dry summers and mild winters. This species initially grows best in a shady situation but after about 30 years it is the leaves that now cast the shade whilst the top of the crown enjoys the sunshine. In the late stage of forest succession the beech displaces all other plants, including the oak. Under good conditions the tree can reach 150 years in age but under optimal conditions it can grow to up to 300 years or more. The height will increase for the first 100 years but is fastest between the 10^th and 40^th year. During its 40th to 80th year, crown growth is gradually completed and the tree takes on its adult form.

Every five to six years the beech will produce a good harvest of nuts. In these so-called ‘mast years’ the beech invests almost two thirds of that year’s assimilated sugars into the nuts. Having fallen, the seeds will only germinate once a thick layer of foliage or soil covers them.

The edible beech nuts, packaged in small neat quantities and enclosed by the husk (the cupule), are distributed by wood mice, squirrels etc. which bury the nuts as a winter store.

The tree lives in symbiosis with fungi (mycorrhiza).

Each day one adult beech delivers 9,000 liters of oxygen into the atmosphere, enough to support as many as 10 people. Each day they also absorb much particulate matter from the air.

The words "beech" and "book" may be related because the German people, using runic script, first wrote on beech wood panels. In the early days of the printing press, letters and woodcuts were made from beech wood as it was easy to use. Therefore it is not surprising that the words "beech" and "book" are closely related.

Cultivars

Fagus sylvatica ‘Tortuosa’

The green-leaved cultivar 'Tortuosa' has no stem, but rather horizontal overlapping branches. This creates a low, wide shrub with a tangle of branches although at maturity it can reach such a height that it is possible to stand under it.

Fagus sylvatica ‘Tortuosa Purpurea'

Fagus sylvatica ‘Tortuosa Purpurea’ is the sister of the red-leaved 'Tortuosa' beech. This colour variant arose after crossing a red-leaved beech (with a normal upright growth habit) and 'Tortuosa’ the prostrate beech with twisted branches. Doubly ‘abnormal’!

Fagus sylvatica 'Atropunicea’ or copper beech

The copper beech is a red form of the common beech, which is found in almost all European deciduous forests. Beech trees can reach a great age and thus height and size, and belong to the mature (climax) forest. Having red leaves is a rare mutation, which can occasionally occur in the wild. By growing the copper beech on as a cultivar it became a popular addition to parks and estates.

Fagus sylvatica ‘Oudenbosch’: the common beech of Oudenbosch

In October 1996 three visitors to the Oudenbosch Arboretum discovered a seedling of the common beech whose leaf was similar to that of the cultivar 'Striata' (meaning striped) that had been in circulation since 1850. This striped beech was discovered in the Czech Republic. According to the German beech specialist, Gerhard Dönig, the leaf of the striped beech in Oudenbosch was shorter and rounder than that of the striped beech growing in the Czech Republic. For the same shape to have arisen twice in nature is somewhat extraordinary. This seedling was given the cultivar name of Fagus sylvatica 'Oudenbosch'.

Variegated leaves sometimes occur in green-leaved species of plants, as a result of a genetic mutation in part of the plant. But what will happen when the fruits of this tree are sown, only time will tell.

Fagus sylvatica 'Pendula' or weeping beech

Because of its size the green, weeping beech is a tree for an estate or park.

Sown seeds of the weeping beech rarely develop into a seedling of this variety. Once a number of beech trees with pendulous branches had been identified and subsequently cultivatated, weeping beeches could be grafted, i.e. a branch of a weeping beech is grafted onto a rootstock of a common beech. In this way three types of green leaf beech have been successfully cultivated, and a fourth with a red leaf.

In 1836 an Englishman, George Loddiges, from a nursery near London of the same name described a Fagus sylvatica var. pendula. The heavy main branches were held almost horizontally; above them some of the crown branches grew in a wide arc. All side branches were pendulous, often reaching down as far as the ground.

Fagus sylvatica  'Aspleniifolia'

The fern-leafed beech in the Leiden Botanic Gardens was planted around 1818. It is a tree with a thick trunk that has the potential to reach 20 meters or higher and bears a very dense crown. The bark is extremely thin. Immediately under the bark is a growth layer that needs protecting from the sun’s rays, thus the beech also makes a dense canopy. The variety 'Aspleniifolia', meaning fern-leaf, has leaves of various shapes. Sometimes one leaf type may dominate but usually all variations of normal beech leaves – from dissected to very narrow and linear - are present on the same tree.

This variety was discovered in France in 1811, and so was a novelty when it was planted in the Botanic Garden. In the spring, when enough sunlight can reach the ground beneath the fern-leafed beech, all kinds of introduced plants such the hollow Corydalis, Star of Bethlehem and wild garlic are able to grow.

Fagus sylvatica f. bornyensis

The French variety Fagus sylvatica f. bornyensis, named by Simon Louis Frères from a nursery of the same name in Plantières near Metz, was described and published in 1870. It is a green, weeping beech with a continuously growing crown, tighter drooping branches usually located on one side, narrower than the cultivar 'Pendula' ( = pendulous).

Fagus sylvatica ‘Miltonensis’

The English variety 'Miltonensis' is a weeping beech with a more horizontal branching habit prior to becoming pendulous. It was discovered prior to 1899 in Milton Park, Northamptonshire. It is a tree with a straight trunk and a few horizontal branches. About 1400 years ago the beech arrived in the north and northeast of the Netherlands, it then reached its optimum extent in about the year 1000.