Nothing quite completes a home beautiful home landscape like a few properly placed shade trees.
Shade trees are an excellent way to add lasting color and texture to your home. In addition, they provide much-needed protection from the scorching hot rays of the sun.
A well placed tree or set of trees can keep a house, patio or outside entertaining area up to 10 to 15 degrees cooler on warm, sunny days.
The spectacular fall foliage of the sugar maple tree
The key is choosing a tree that grows well in your area, and that can stand up to a little beating from Mother Nature now and then. Some of the faster growing shade trees may grow a little too fast, leaving them more susceptible to wind and storm damage.
The Bradford Pear tree is an excellent example of this. Although it grows quickly and provides measurable shade in just a few years, that fast growth leads to poor branch strength and structure.
The result is a tree that is easily damaged by high winds.
With that in mind, we thought we would cover a few shade trees today that grow well, but stay strong against the wrath of Mother Nature.
Here are 3 shade trees that grow at a steady rate of 1 to 2 feet of growth per year, and can still stand up to the weather.
3 Excellent Shade Trees For Your Landscape
Sugar Maple
Growing Zone 3 – 8
One of the most beautiful trees around, the Sugar Maple tree is well known for its spectacular fall foliage.
The leaves of a sugar maple turn colors ranging from a fiery red to a brilliant orange. The tree is known for naturally growing straight and true.
Most species grow anywhere from 40 to 100 feet in height at full maturity. This is also the tree of course, that produces that wonderful maple syrup in the early months of each year!
Tulip Tree
Growing Zones 4 – 9
The Tulip tree (pictured at top) is a faster growing shade tree that is extremely hardy and pest resistant. It is well-known and grows extremely well throughout the upper South and Midwestern states.
The tree blooms in late Spring with big, gorgeous tulip-shaped flowers with a hint of orange and yellow.
The Tulip tree grows 60 to 90′ tall and about 40′ wide at full maturity.
Black Alder
Growing Zones 3- 9
Black Alder foliage
The Black Alder tree is an excellent choice where poor growing soil might be an issue. These trees can grow in a wide variety of problematic soils and have a high tolerance to both waterlogged areas, and locations that tend to be more dry.
They grow in a very dramatic pyramid-style shape, and can reach a height of about 60 to 70 feet. They have glossy green leaves, and the grey bark of the tree stands unique in the landscape.
Alder trees have a very deep and strong root structure, so it is best to plant them out away from the house.
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