Shadows cast by leaves o a Horse Chestnut tree.
The genus Aesculus, the buckeyes and horse-chestnuts, comprises 13-19 species of woody trees and shrubs native to the temperate northern hemisphere, with 6 species native to North America and 7-13 species native to Eurasia; there are also several hybrids. Species are deciduous or evergreen. This genus has traditionally been treated in the ditypic family Hippocastanaceae along with Billia[1], but recent phyloegentic analysis of morphological[2] and molecular data[3] has led to this family, along with the Aceraceae (Maples and Dipteronia), being included in the soapberry family (Sapindaceae). The North American species are known as buckeyes and the Eurasian species as horse-chestnuts. Some are also called white chestnut or red chestnut (as in some of the Bach flower remedies. In Britain, they are sometimes called conker trees because of their link with the game of conkers, played with the nuts, also called conkers. The name horse-chestnut (hyphenated here to avoid confusion with the true chestnuts (Castanea, Fagaceae)) is also often given as "horse chestnut" or "horsechestnut". One species very popular in cultivation, the common horse-chestnut Aesculus hippocastanum is also often known as just "horse-chestnut". Linnaeus named the genus Aesculus after the Roman name for an edible acorn. The use of the term "horse" refers to their strength or inedibility, and does not here refer to their fitness as fodder for horses, except in folk etymology. The name buckeye derives from the resemblance of the seed to the brown eye of a buck (male deer), and horse-chestnut from the external resemblance of the seed to a chestnut, but being inedible. The buckeye blooms in summer and the horse-chestnut in late spring.
Size: 5128px × 3409px
Location: Near Sawrey, Ambleside, Lake District, England.
Photo credit: © Simon Hathaway / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: aesculus, area, beauty, britain, british, chesnut, conker, conservation, cumbria, district, england, english, genus, hippocastanum, horse, horse-chestnuts, lake, leaf, leaves, national, natural, outstanding, park, pattern, shadow, silhouette, sky, spring, tourism, tourist, travel, tree, windermere
