Fall Foliage Tracker

Get to Know Central Park's Trees

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  Plant

  Sugar Maple

  Between its superbly sweet sap (boiled down to make maple syrup) and its spectacular fall foliage, it’s no wonder that the sugar maple is a crowd-pleaser. New York even chose the sugar maple to be its state tree!
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  Plant

  Pin Oak

  There are pin oaks aplenty in Central Park, where these beautiful, hardy trees are outnumbered only by the black cherry. On pin oaks, the classic oak-leaf lobes have delicate points, and in the fall, the leaves turn russet and bronze.
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  Plant

  Hickory

  Central Park is home to four different kinds of hickory, and when it comes to identifying them, check out the bark. Hickory bark tends to be rough, and one particular kind—shagbark hickory—even features gray bark that peels off in long strips. In the autumn, hickory leaves turn a vibrant yellow.
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  Plant

  Tupelo

  With its orange, yellow, and fire-engine red leaves, the black tupelo is one of the most gorgeous trees in the Park in autumn. And it’s not just human leaf-peepers who adore it: Migratory birds love its berries, which ripen at the same time its leaves change color. One of Central Park’s most iconic spots for fall foliage is the Ramble’s Tupelo Meadow, where you’ll find a magnificent three-trunked black tupelo offering a colorful fall foliage display.
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  Plant

  Sweetgum

  There are more than 100 sweetgum trees in Central Park, and it was likely growing wild in the area before the Park’s construction. Arguably offering the widest color range of all the Park’s tree species, it can turn purple, orange, red, or even pink in the fall. Sweetgums have star-shaped leaves, making them pretty no matter the season.
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  Plant

  Bald Cypress

  The bald cypress may look like an evergreen, but it’s actually a deciduous conifer, forming cones in the summer and dropping needles in fall. If you see something that looks like an evergreen dipped in bronze, that’s the bald cypress. At around 50 to 70 feet in height, the bald cypress may seem tall, but when compared to its relatives—the giant sequoia and California redwood—it turns out to be the small one in its family!
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  Plant

  Black Cherry

  The black cherry is the most common tree in Central Park. It has long, shiny leaves that turn yellow and red in autumn. Although the black cherry is only distantly related to the trees that provide the cherries we humans eat, birds and mammals both love its fruit, and its leaves provide food for the Eastern tiger swallowtail butterfly.
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  Plant

  Star Magnolia

  Magnolias are best known for their springtime flowers, but in the fall, their leaves put on a stunning display of yellow and bronze. Just a handful of star magnolia have been planted in Central Park, but it’s no wonder that our arborists love this tree: When pruned, it gives off a subtle lemon scent.