Summer at the BEECH (Fagus grandifolia)

 

Sun shines through beech leaves in a hemlock-hardwood climax forest near 

Big Pond, PA, on July 3rd. (Climax forests are the peak of plant succession 
for a given climate and location.) 

When I first became interested in botany, ca 1970,* American Beech (Fagus grandifolia) was a widespread and distinctive tree of mature and old-growth beech-maple and hemlock-hardwood climax forests on soils with a moderate to ample moisture content. They were generally lacking from drought-tolerant oak-hickory forests that dominated the higher, well-drained plateaus of the Allegheny Province crossing from Pennsylvania into New York on the NW side of the Appalachians. Beech has a shallow, wide-spreading root system, whereas hickories have deep tap roots and oaks start with a taproot that is gradually replaced by a dense, bowl-shaped lateral system. 

In the 18th and 19th centuries, beech disappeared from suitable lowlands because early settlers realized the presence of beech indicated good farmland. In the last few decades, beech has been disappearing, like so many other native trees, because it is under attack from foreign invaders. Beech bark disease begins when the European beech-scale insect, Cryptococcus fagisuga, drills into the bark, creating a pathway for infection by Neonectria species of fungi. A canker develops and the tree is killed. A newer infection called Beech Leaf Disease (BLD) appeared in Ohio in 2012 and has been spreading through the northeast. "BLD is identifiable by its primary symptom: dark green bands of thickened tissue between the leaf veins." It's probably just a matter of time until it reaches the Northwoods like the Adirondacks.

Beech leaves are pinnately [feather] veined with each parallel side vein ending in a sharp point on the leaf edge. (June 12th at Junius Ponds, Seneca County, NY, 

before the spread of Beech Leaf Disease)

Beech is readily recognized by its smooth, light-gray bark, unlike the darker and furrowed, scaly or shaggy bark of other forest species. Its alternate leaves are rounded or short-tapered at the base and longer pointed at the tips. A main central leaf vein, or midrib, from the short stem to the tip is pinnately [feather] veined on both sides. Each parallel lateral vein is tipped with a sharp tooth on the leaf edge.

Because American Beech is shade-tolerant, it does well in mature woods. 

This grove in a forest near Big Pond, PA, likely developed from 

a combination of nut dispersal and root sprouts (a.k.a. root "suckers").

Prior to the Pleistocene Ice Age, beech was a transcontinental species from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Post glacially, its range constricted to roughly the eastern half of the United States and north into adjacent Canada. A beech subspecies (or to some botanists, a separate species) is scattered in Mexico. 

more at iNaturalist - American Beech

There is a wide variety of beech photos on Flora of Pennsylvania.

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*On a personal note, my interest in plants, particularly native woodland and wetland wildflowers, is thanks to the Botany Section of the Rochester Academy of Sciences and, by association and extension, to the Bergen Swamp Preservation Society of Western New York. As an assistant scoutmaster handling a variety of outdoor, nature and science merit badges at the time, I rapidly expanded into every facet of natural history.