Plant Family: Salicaceae
Growth Form: Small to medium-sized tree, 5 to 20 meters in height.
Leaves: Alternate, simple, heart-shaped or round, with fine teeth, green above, whitish below; the petioles are flattened and tremble in even the slightest breeze; leaves turn an attractive golden yellow in the fall.
Bark: Creamy white to greenish-gray, becoming fissured and darker on older trees, especially at the base.
Flowers: Dioecious; in long hanging catkins, appearing in spring before the leaves.
Fruits: Small pointed green capsules in long hanging clusters; they open to reveal the seeds carried on cottony tufts.
Habitat: A pioneer species that colonizes burns, abandoned fields, dry open woods, and clearings in Spruce-Fir forests.
Range: Quaking Aspen has a very broad distribution, ranging from New England and eastern Canada west across the continent to Alaska and California, and south in the Rocky Mountains to Mexico.
Similar Species: Bigtooth Aspen has fewer and larger teeth along the leaf margins.
Comments: Aspens are favored by Beaver, who feed on the bark and use the trunks and branches to construct their dams and lodges. Quaking Aspen is the state tree of Utah.
