Giant nebari. I love it.

Guilty!!! Key West, FL is not in zone 9. So I guess this is really not a zone 9 article. But what the heck! It's not about bonsai either.

On my recent honeymoon (thanks) to the Keys I had the opportunity to see numerous trees growing in ways that are just not typical for our cooler zone 9. There where various ficus growing in full size "banyan" style. There where several Brassaia actinophylla (schefflera or umbrella tree) as well that also displayed their aerial roots in the banyan style. But I think my favorite where the hidden treasures I came across while exploring this sub-tropical part of our state.

Amazing buttonwood. Thanks Mary.

On her website, Mary Miller recommends visiting this old buttonwood located on the corner of Leon and Washington. I followed my map there and biked my way to it expecting to see a nice tree. What I found left me stunned for about 30 minutes.

Big is not the word for this ancient and magnificent conocarpus erectus. I marveled at it's sinuous trunk and massive branches that made it hard to know if I was looking at one tree or several that where wound together. The main trunk had long hollowed out leaving a cavernous void that a small adult could easily fit in.

Did I say it was huge? Yeah... it is.

I left that tree thinking of the hundreds of years it's been growing in that very spot, outliving everything else that was around it. It was humbling.

It seemed that everywhere I looked there was a ficus of some sort growing, giant and impressive with curtains of aerial roots draped all along their thick branches. The most impressive one is located in the front yard of the aptly named "Banyan Resort".

I don't know what type of ficus it is (if it even is one) but that barely seems to matter when you are standing underneath it's sprawling canopy. It impressively starts in one portion of the yard, almost completely claiming the entire square, and reach out and over adjacent driveways, planting it's giant aerial roots into other sections of the yard, greedily claiming any open land. Yeah, you have to see this if you are there.

Amazing ficus banya

There are so many wonderful trees in this town it was easy for a tree geek like me to forget that there is tons of other stuff I was supposed to be doing. Lucky for me, my new wife understands me very well. Scary.