Alnus sieboldiana ("Obayashabushi")

Japanese name: オオバヤシャブシ （大葉夜叉五倍子）
Scientific name: Alnus sieboldiana

[Overview]
A deciduous shrub or small tree 5–10 m tall, found in mountains near the coast on the Pacific side.
Shrubby plants branch freely from the base.
The bark is grayish brown with many round lenticels.
Leaves are simple and alternate, ovate or triangular-ovate, 6–12 cm long and 3–6 cm wide, almost hairless, thick and glossy, with glandular dots on the underside.
The lateral veins are parallel, in 11–16 pairs.
The leaf margins have sharp serrations.
There are male and female flowers, which bloom at about the same time as the leaves unfold.
The male flowers grow on cylindrical catkins 4–5 cm long, which hang down singly from the leaf axils of the previous year's branches.
The male catkins have no stalk.
The male flowers are small, borne three at a time beside scale-like bracts; the perianth is 4-lobed and there are 4 stamens.
The female flowers grow in cone-like inflorescences produced singly above the male catkins.
The female inflorescences have a stalk 1–2 cm long.
The female flowers have no perianth.
The fruiting spike is elliptical and cone-like, 2–2.5 cm long, with fruits attached to the inner surface of the scales.
The fruit is a flattened nut with a wing on each side and the style remaining at the tip.

[Uses]
The fruits and bark are used as tannin agents, mordants and the like.

[Cultivation]
Propagate from seed or by cuttings.
Symbiotic fungi allow it to grow well even in poor soil.
Plant it in a sunny place.
There are no particular pests or diseases.

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