Paper birch

Paper Birch (Betula papyrifera) usually reaches a height of 50-60 ft. It is the provincial tree of Saskatchewan and undoubtedly one of the most loved trees to ever grace prairie gardens and forests. Native to northern Canada, Alaska, and northern Europe, the paper birch was indispensable to our First Nations people first and foremost for canoe building, but also for platters, roofing material, sleds, snowshoes, paddles, arrows, and tool handles. Not only did they use the wood, but they also used the bark. It is interesting to note that they only harvested bark from dead trees- never living ones. Paper birch is a gorgeous tree with striking, pure white bark that slowly ages to orangey brown. The medium green leaves become a luminous yellow in the fall.

A few cultivars have been introduced, and paper birch can be single or multi trunked. ‘Chickadee’ was developed by the University of North Dakota and is faster growing than the species and quite narrow- having an almost columnar shape. Two other introductions that were made in 2002 have shown good promise as landscape specimens.

The first is ‘Prairie Dream’, which grows 40 ft. tall and up to 30 ft. wide. It was selected from the driest known region in the northern US where paper birch are known to grow. It is far more tolerant of stress than other cultivars and very resistant to bronze birch borer.

‘Reflection’ is the most rapid growing selection of paper birch and is also very narrow, reaching 30 ft. tall and only 10 ft. wide. It is a good substitute for Swedish columnar aspen. This form was developed from the only paper birch left standing after a huge birch borer epidemic in the northern US and is being marketed as “borer resistant”.

Zone 1 for the species, the North Dakota cultivars are officially listed as zone 3.