Readers share favourite Vancouver trees: giant sequoia, maples, ginkgos, and more

When Tyee contributor J.B. MacKinnon embarked on a tour of Vancouver's best trees, readers responded with enthusiasm, sharing photos and sketches of their own local favourites.

Reader Bruce Mohun offered two picks: the oak in Alexandra Park and a wingnut around the corner from him. He also sent sketches of a tulip tree near the tennis courts in Stanley Park and a poplar beside the Aquatic Centre with its resident and rare taiga flycatcher.

Other readers painted vivid pictures of their favourite urban trees. Rod Raglin described the 4700 block of Fleming Street, "very ordinary except for the eight majestic big leaf maples that line both sides of the boulevard." Tightly clustered, these giant trees have developed narrow crowns and trunks free of branches for half their height. "Their magnificent canopy offers an oasis of cool in the summer and a spectacular display in the fall. Standing among them, listening to them breeze-speak, caressing their trunks puts things into perspective," he wrote.

Louisa Smith loves katsuras, particularly several enormous ones on Brightwood Place in her neighbourhood. "They look best at the time of year when their leaves have just emerged, bright green against the dark moss-covered branches." She noted one house at the end of the cul-de-sac cut down its katsura, and "the gap is really glaring."

Other favourite spots include shirotae cherry trees in Helmcken Park (Pacific and Cambie), planted in 1986 for Expo and now 40 years old; Northern catalpa, Caucasian wingnut, princess tree, and cherry trees at Thornton Park by the Main Street SkyTrain; two Black Locust on the west side of Dumfries with foliage that "nearly glows" when backlit by afternoon sun; and a series of majestic ginkgo bilobas walking west on Pender from Main. Ginkgos, with their majestic beauty and urban hardiness, turn vivid yellow in fall — one reader has favoured them since spotting a mature yellow specimen in 1999.