# Tall, Conical Italian Trees **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 10, 2009, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780 "2009-12-10T21:48:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2009, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/1 "2009-12-10T21:48:26Z")
What are the tall, conical trees in [this photograph of the Italian countryside](http://198.66.250.20/bookeasy/usersfv/999/2018_7555.jpg)? Such trees, and similar brethren, appear to be a staple of Italian landscape photography and art, but damn if I know what they are. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2009, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/2 "2009-12-10T21:51:17Z")
Italian cypress, logically enough. > **[Cupressus sempervirens](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cupressus_sempervirens)** > > Cupressus sempervirens, the Mediterranean cypress (also known as Italian cypress, Tuscan cypress, Persian cypress, or pencil pine), is a species of cypress native to the eastern Mediterranean region, in northeast Libya, southern Albania, southern and coastal Bulgaria, southern Ukraine (Crimea), coastal Croatia and Slovenia, southern Montenegro, southern Bosnia and Herzegovina, southwestern North Macedonia, southern Greece, southern Turkey, Cyprus, northern Egypt, western Syria, Lebanon, Malta, ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2009, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/3 "2009-12-10T21:51:29Z")
I’m pretty sure they’re [Italian cypress](http://www.fast-growing-trees.com/ItalianCypress.htm). That’s a lovely shot of an Italian villa you found there. I think it might become my wallpaper for awhile. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2009, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/4 "2009-12-10T21:55:43Z")
Italian cypress. I have a little one in my living room window. ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2009, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/5 "2009-12-10T23:14:32Z")
> [@teela\_brown](#): > > I’m pretty sure they’re [Italian cypress](http://www.fast-growing-trees.com/ItalianCypress.htm). > > That’s a lovely shot of an Italian villa you found there. I think it might become my wallpaper for awhile. How can you use such a tiny low-res photo as your wallpaper? Unless you’re posting from a cell phone, I mean. ---
**Author:** ![freckafree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/freckafree/32/3050_2.png) [@freckafree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/freckafree)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/6 "2009-12-11T02:36:28Z")
I’m not sure what other people think, but I vote for Italian cypress. By the way, I want to cook a goose for Christmas, but I hear they are greasy. Is that true? ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/7 "2009-12-11T02:41:39Z")
Minority report here. While I think the picture linked to inthe OP is Italian cypress, another candidate is the [Lombardy poplar](http://landscaping.about.com/od/landscapedesignprivacy/p/lombardy_poplar.htm), which has the same ‘habit’ (growth shape) and looks quite similar from a distance. ---
**Author:** ![movingfinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@movingfinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/movingfinger)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/8 "2009-12-11T06:05:30Z")
Since they seem to be popular around funeral homes, at least here in SoCal, I have always thought of them as Mortuary Cypresses. Lombardy Poplars, then. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/9 "2009-12-11T06:40:49Z")
They’re two quite different trees, with very similar ‘habits’. Note that foliage on the cypresses goes nearly to ground level, while the poplars have bare trunk below the columnar leafy area. The ones in the OP picture seem to be the cypresses; the point I was making is that many such columnar trees (nearly all I’ve seen) were the Lombardy poplars. Not that the identification for the particular trees asked about in the OP was wrong; I think it’s right – but rather that there are in fact two quite different “Italian columns” trees. ---
**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/10 "2009-12-11T15:34:48Z")
Would they hold up in central Illinois (hot, humid summers, cold (very cold) winters)? Would I be committing an environmental crime (like importing kudzu) if I planted one here? ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/11 "2009-12-11T16:05:59Z")
Re poplar vs. cypress: Of course, similar shape aside, the poplar is a broadleaf, whereas the cypress is a conifer. You can tell at quite a distance whether a particular tall skinny tree has leaves or needles. In the SF Bay area, Italian Cypress seems to be a relatively common landscape tree. The Lombardy isn’t as poplar, err, popular. Personally, I think it’s a stupid looking tree, but to each to their own. A page on it’s characteristics: > **[Plantname Archives](https://www.backyardgardener.com/plantname/)** > > Do you want to learn how to plant a shrub, tree, perennial or a vine? You can learn how hardy the plant is before you plant it in your garden. 33K plants That says USDA zones 7 to 9, which says that IL may be too cold for it, but there are some other blurbs out there saying that it will grow in “the lower 48”. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/12 "2009-12-11T16:13:45Z")
Oh, and before I get called on it, yeah, I know it doesn’t actually have needles, but scale-like leaves. I was speaking about being able to generally tell a conifer from a broadleaf at a distance. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/13 "2009-12-11T17:25:46Z")
I’ve heard them called “pencil cypress” too. ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2009, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tall-conical-italian-trees/520780/14 "2009-12-11T20:30:55Z")
> [@movingfinger](#): > > Since they seem to be popular around funeral homes, at least here in SoCal, I have always thought of them as Mortuary Cypresses. Which makes sense, as in Renaissance and later art, the Italian cypress was a symbol of death.