Online Virtual Flora of Wisconsin

Fagus grandifolia Ehrh.

Family: Fagaceae

American beech, beechnut

[Fagus americana Sweet, more...]

Know Your Trees

Kenneth J. Sytsma

University of Wisconsin - Madison (WIS-VP)

Open Interactive Map

Etymology: Fagus: Latin "to eat" referring to esculent nuts
Plants: perennial, deciduous tree to 65' tall; smooth, gray bark
Leaves: oval to narrowly oval, base slightly or more pointed, underside with scattered hairs
Flowers: blooms in spring
Fruits: brown to reddish brown "bur" opening when ripe; nuts sharply angled and often hollow
Habitat: rich woods
Conservation Status: Native

Rich mesic forests where it is co-dominant with sugar maple and/or hemlock, also growing with hemlock-yellow birch, sugar maple-red oak, sugar maple-basswood, hemlock-white pine- balsam fir-paper birch, white cedar-hemlock, red maple-white pine-red oak. Beech also grows in swampy woods with sugar maple-elm-black ash, red maple-black ash-white cedar, white cedar- aspen-black ash, mixed conifers, green ash-white cedar. It can also be found on wooded swale ridges along Lake Michigan and rarely on wooded rock outcrops with bitternut hickory. Wisconsin is at the western edge of the range of beech and its restricted distribution in the state has been heavily studied (Ward, 1956; Ward 1958). Beech arrived in the state 7,000 years ago either via long-distance dispersal over Lake Michigan or by expansion around the southern tip of the lake (Davis et al., 1986). It also spread southward into the state from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Environmental and dispersal limitations appear to be the cause of its range limit in the state (Seeley, Goring, & Williams, 2019), which is mainly within the boundaries of Ecological Landscapes associated with Lake Michigan. Trees in the northern part of its range reproduce via seed more readily than those in the south and this has been attributed to higher seed viability and more favorable conditions for seed germination in the north (Dix & Skretny, 1965). Beech grows from Racine northward, extending west in Washington Co. (and at a single locality in Dodge Co.), then curving back north, away from Lake Winnebago. In the northeast part of the state, it is abundant from Brown to Door Cos. and extends west into Outagamie and Waupaca Cos. with a few records from the extreme northeast corner of Winnebago Co. It then spreads farther west through Shawano Co. into Marinette and Oconto Cos. finally reaching its northernmost extent in Forest Co. Other taxa in the state are also tightly associated with the so- called “Beech Border” such as Medeola virginiana and Carex laxiflora. Beech is a beautiful forest tree with tight, gray bark unlike any of our other trees. Beeches across eastern North America are being killed by Beech Bark Disease, an introduced fungus spread by a scale insect. The bark of diseased trees becomes roughened with scares and wounds. The disease was first detected in Wisconsin trees in 2009.