Ginkgo (Maidenhair Tree)non-native

Field guide

'Autumn Gold' is a male (fruitless) clone of Ginkgo biloba, a "living fossil" with no close living relatives, growing 40–50 ft. tall with a symmetrical, broadly spreading crown and distinctive fan-shaped, two-lobed leaves. Selected in 1951 in San Jose, CA for uniform, luminous golden fall color, its leaves drop rapidly—often in a single day after a hard frost—into a golden carpet. Exceptionally tough, it tolerates compaction, pollution, drought, salt and a wide pH range, a premier urban specimen and street tree. As a wind-pollinated Asian species it provides essentially no native-insect value.

Gardener's notes

Plant this one purely for beauty and toughness—give it full sun and room to reach 40-plus feet, and it shrugs off city soil, salt and pollution for a century. The payoff is that single magical day in fall when the whole golden canopy drops at once. Being a male clone, it spares you the infamous stinky fruit.

Ecology

• Pollinators: wind-pollinated — none
• Birds: minimal (male—no fruit)

Care this season

• Pruning: minimal (strong structure); slow first years then ~1 ft/yr
• Toxicity: female seeds are notorious—but this is a MALE clone (fruitless, no odor)

Sources

• Ginkgo biloba — Missouri Botanical Garden
• Ginkgo cultivar checklist — University of Kentucky Extension