Hi,
Finally, I feel like I'm posting a not-so-obvious question. We're vacationing in South Carolina, and we've notice a distinct association of Live Oak - Southern Magnolia pairs in the barrier islands. Sometimes their branches entertwine, almost fusing together; other pairs seem to grow side by side parallel to each other. Why?
I'd venture the first potential (natural) answer:
Birds consume fruit produced by Magnolia grandiflora, and poop out seeds while perched in the Quercus virginiana. Seeds sprout, and you get an interestingly intimate association as illustrated.
That was my thought too.
Resin
Truly brilliant, but would you consider a loose end to your theory the fact that this association doesn't seem to happen between say, hickories and Japanese tallows? Wouldn't it call for a specialized bird with particular perching and eathing habits?
A quick disclaimer here: although the observation about this association is great, it is not mine. We went for a tour with a horticuralist, who mentioned it as his finding. He didn't have an explanation, but the actual fact of an association between live oaks and magnolias is obvious once you've been clued into it. He never mentioned any other similar tree pairing of other kinds.
Knowing little about South Carolina habitats, soils, flora, and fauna, I can't venture to discount or support the local horticulturist's opinion. I know even less about tallows. Don't see them much up this way.
I don't think that there are specialized birds for Southern magnolia seed - but I guess there could be. I'd imagine there's more of a soils and moisture regime affinity between the trees that you often see together.
If that tallow is an invasive that is ubiquitous, it is probably pretty slutty and pairs up with just about anything.
OK. I'm probably just adding noise to the conversation by going well over my head with all this. Just to avoid confusion, though, I want to clarify that the observation by the local horticultist was that live oaks and magnolias grew often close together, as in the picture at the beginning of the thread.
In a probably lame attempt at playing devil's advocate against the bird theory, I brought up as a counterargument that no such other association between two trees has been noted. In this regard, I completely made up as an example other possible associations that could, but do not happen, such as a tallow and a hickory.
The only resemblance between my example and reality is that the local horticulturist mentioned that they had a problem with Chinese tallow trees as an invasive and aggressive species that was being injected to erradicate and leave simply as a dead structure for birds with a liking for the tree.
