With bright colors and interesting shapes, unusual tree and shrub bark can add visual interest to winter landscapes. Many types of bark become more distinctive and sought after during winter months.

Here it is, the season of same-old-same-old: same old freezing rain, same old snow, same old chill winds, gray skies and barren, shivering timbers. In most parts of the country, it is the season of ...

Bark is a compilation of dead cells that are gradually sloughed off as the trunk grows in diameter. It is formed by an amazing, thin layer of cells known as the vascular cambium. Outer bark — the part ...

The center of a tree or shrub stem (from roots to trunk, branches, and twigs) is woody, composed of xylem cells that conduct water from the roots to the upper parts of the tree. That woody section is ...

Mary Jo DiLonardo has worked in print, online, and broadcast journalism for 25 years and covers nature, health, science, and animals. Young trees sometimes have smooth bark that's unbroken by ridges.

Every garden is a thing of beauty in the growing seasons — spring bulbs, summer flowers and fall foliage all carry on with extravagance. But winter is coming, so the colorful garden superstars will ...

Vertical cracks on tree trunks caused when warm, sunny days are followed by bitter cold. Trees most vulnerable: Beech, crabapple, horsechestnut, linden, maple, oak, sycamore, willow, yellow poplar ...

Q: Over the last couple of years, our Norway and Sunset maples have developed long, vertical splits in the bark. These splits can be as much as four feet long. This spring, some of them have been ...

In 1996, when German visual artist Birgitta Volz was dabbling with wood printing and tree bark printing, she felt particularly attracted to a rather “unspectacular” willow ( Salix caprea) tree. She ...

Just before the first snow, I went for a walk in the woods near our house. It’s a damp and mossy mixed wood full of the usual suspects: cedar, white pine, balsam, birch, beech, the occasional maple ...