This Sycamore was found in Longford Park just set back from a football field growing in a tree row. Sycamores are a fast-growing and vigorous deciduous tree with a very spreading habit and a broadly domed crown.
The branches are usually quite thick near the main bole, terminating in grey-green twigs with pale lenticels and reddish buds.
The leaves are opposite and up to 15cm long. They are divided into 5 toothed lobes. Young or fast growing Sycamores has deeply cut leaves and long scarlet petioles. However mature, slow growing Sycamores have smaller leaves with more shallow lobes and shorter pink or green petioles. This is a very large, mature Sycamore and you can see the pinky, green petioles here.
Sycamore flowers are long and pendulous in small yellow clusters up to 12cm long. They are prolific and slender and open around april-may. The fruits open in late summer and are paired reaching 6cm long. They hold two seeds and each seed is buried in a wing. The fruits are often called 'Helicopters' as when they drop they rotate as they float to the ground like a helicopter landing.
The bark is greyish and broken up by numerous fissures forming irregular patches that sometimes fall away leaving a more orange colour underneath.
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