If you ask most people, they can probably tell you their favorite animal. But it’s mostly us true botany dorks who will drop the Latin name of their favorite tree. For a long time, it was Quercus virginiana (live oak) for me. Sturdy and tall, hauntingly beautiful, classically Southern; it’s hard not to love a species that is known to live 500 years. But at some point my head was turned by the jaw-dropping beauty of a Magnolia macrophylla (bigleaf magnolia), and I’ve been its biggest fan ever since.
Florida and the southern United States are home to a number of magnolia species, from the classic Southern magnolia to the smaller, silver-leafed sweet bay magnolia found in freshwater wetlands (and grandma’s gumbo). But the bigleaf magnolia is one you’ll never forget. True to its name, the typical leaf may be a foot wide and 2-3 feet long, even on a sapling. The blooms—white and fragrant like other magnolias—are enormous, too, often over a foot in diameter. This species has the largest leaves and blooms of any native North American tree.
Bigleaf magnolias are less common in Florida, although they can be found in the high ground around the Apalachicola Bluffs that closely mimic Appalachian hardwood forest ecology. Recently in Tennessee, I saw them growing in low lying areas near ferns but also on higher ground, in rich organic forest humus.
Their large leaves tear in heavy wind, so they are not as wind resistant as their Southern magnolia cousins, and fare better in protected forest areas. A similar, Florida panhandle-only close relative to the bigleaf magnolia is the Ashe magnolia (Magnolia ashei), which also has large leaves and blooms. It does not typically grow as tall as the bigleaf, however, averaging 10-15 feet while bigleaf magnolias are often well over 40 feet tall. Ashe magnolia was long considered a variety of bigleaf magnolia but more recently identified as a separate species.
Like other magnolia species, bigleaf magnolias are pollinated by beetles. They are so old, they evolved before most flying insects did!
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