White Poplar, European White Poplar, Silver Poplar,              pop-U-lus AL-ba

• Deciduous, large tree, 40-70 ft (12-21 m) tall with a similar spread.   Bud and twigs covered with short white hairs.  Bark is initially smooth and whitish gray, becoming rough and dark with age.  Leaves alternate, simple, on long shoots 3-5 lobes, coarsely toothed, 5-13 cm long, dark green above, silvery gray and densely woolly underneath, on short branches smaller, only 2.5-5 cm, oval to elliptic-oblong.  Male and female trees (dioecious), small flowers in catkins, male catkins 5-7 cm long, female catkins 7-10 cm long.
• Sun.  Easy to grow.  Does best in moist, deep loam.  Messy and has brittle branches.
• Hardy to USDA Zone 3      Native to Europe, western Siberia, and central Asia.  One of the first trees introduced from Europe to North America, where it has since hybridized with several native Populus species.
• alba: Latin, whitish, a reference to the color of the underside of the leaves.