I was walking down High St. in Upper Falls on the way back from the school bus stop this afternoon with my daughter and some neighbors. At this time of year, for a few weeks, the blooming street trees on High St are absolutely beautiful. I’m not certain but my wife suspects they may be Bradford Pear trees.
Halfway down the street my daughter asked why the flowers smelled like stinking fish. At first we all thought she was messing with us but she insisted that the white blossoms smelled of fish. We pulled a branch down and all took a nose full and sure enough she was right.
Jayla clearly has a better sense of smell than the rest of us but up close there was no mistaking it. They smell of fish … and not in a good way.
We’ve experienced the same nasty fishy smell, right outside Angier school. We also suspected the trees.
I believe the pears around the Newton Centre triangle are Bradford. Do they smell like that, too? I’ll be seeing other tree people tonight as the Board of Aldermen votes on the Tree Ordinance revision, so I’ll see if anyone else knows about smelly pears. Fortunately no one plants Bradford anymore because they have weak branching structure.
You know what kind of tree flower smells nice? Catalpa! Never would have known, but I passed a young one in a yard in Nonantum last year, in bloom, with branches at nose level.
Yup, it’s the Bradford Pear blossoms that smell like rotten fish. Also these tree aren’t very long lived. By the time it reaches maturity at 15-30 years old, the limbs start breaking because of the upward angle the branches grow.
This blog is so educational! 🙂
@mega – that’s what I love. I see something in my world that’s odd, inexplicable, or seemingly strange and there’s always not one but usually at least a few people that have some useful information about it.
Stinky trees – discuss.
Now if I can just tame that auto correct – mega=mgwa
Here’s another friends fontribution …
It’s likely that those trees you posted about are these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrus_calleryana
When I googled “bad smelling trees” I got that link…and many more.
Who knew there were so many nasty smelling trees.
You know it’s bad when the outline in Wikipedia lists “smell” as a distinct category.
Almost retched at the thought…because we planted 3 flowering pear trees on our front lawn about 7 years ago. Ran outside to smell them, and mirabile dictu, they didn’t stink! Whew! But, they sure are pretty, even tho not as pretty as the flowering cherries the pears replaced when the cherries died.
Not to worry … I think the fish smell is very short lived, maybe just a few days when they first blossom