Trees have a broad variety of features to recommend them. Showy blossoms and big, brightly-colored fruit are not the only items that provide ornamentation, as leaves give a tree due to its character, particularly if they’re distinctive. A plethora of leaf-types are available to choose from, like those with fan-shaped foliage and inconspicuous fruit.
Gingko
The maidenhair tree (Gingko biloba) has light to medium green, fan-shaped leaves that turn golden in the autumn when it also creates small yellow or orange drupe-type fruit no bigger than 1.5 inches in dimension. The fruit, which creates a pungent scent, is edible, although its extract can be poisonous. The maidenhair is a vertical tree with an widely spreading canopy, growing best in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 5 to 9. It reaches around 65 feet in full sun or partial shade and can thrive in a broad range of acidic soils, tolerating moist to dry conditions.
Palm
The foliage of the Mexican fan palm (Washingtonia robusta) is synonymous with its title. The fan-shaped fronds, which arrive to five feet in length, grow on stalks on top of one trunk that stands between 80 to 100 feet tall. Its tiny fruit, growing no more than one-half inch in dimension, grows as creamy shiny black drupes. Mexican fan palms grow best in USDA plant hardiness zones 9 to 11, in full sunlight or partial shade. They are drought-resistant but will tolerate wet soil, rather alkaline loam or sand.
Maple
The fernleaf fullmoon maple (Acer japonicum “Aconitifolium”) creates lacy, fan-shaped leaves that range from 3 to 6 inches round. In the autumn, its compact foliage turns vibrant shades of scarlet and orange with touches of purple and yellow before falling. Its fruit, called samaras, are made of winged papery tissue no longer than 1 inch long. The fernleaf fullmoon maple grows in full sunlight to partial shade in USDA zones 5 to 9 at a array of soil types and pH levels.
Cedar
The foliage of the incense cedar tree (Calocedrus decurrens) rises in the shape of flat, fanning sprays of aromatic dark green needles. A columnar evergreen that reaches around 90 feet tall, it still produces fruit in the summer or fall in the kind of one-half-inch into 1 1/2-inch brown or red cones. The incense cedar flourishes in USDA zones 5 to 8, tolerating full sunlight to partial shade. Drought-resistant, it grows in all kind of acidic soils which range from moist to dry.
