Park Ranger #25 - Tweet Tweet
5th cache in Schenley Park!!! (1-10 in Highland Park, 11-20 in Frick Park)
Cache: You are looking for a camouflaged container that isn't your typical hide. With the hints, you should have no trouble spotting it! Please read the description if going over to find "Park Ranger #24 - Tree of Life" before attempting that grab. Good Luck!
The Sweet Buckeye (Also known as yellow buckeye) tree can have a 3' diameter trunk and grow upwards of 90' tall. If anyone is from Ohio, this is your State Tree! The bark, leaves and the fruit are poisonous when digested! Identification: Buckeyes are the only trees or shrubs with opposite compound leaves where the leaflets are arranged like the spokes of a wheel. Horsechestnut, Sweet Buckeye and Ohio Buckeye are the most popular ones in our area. So how do you tell them apart? The fruit is the easiest way, but that isn't always an option. The fruit of the Horsechestnut is thory, Sweet has smooth, and Ohio is also thorny, but the thorns are weak and easily break off. No fruit? Horsechestnuts typically have 7-9 leaflets, and the other two have 5 (but sometimes 4-7, as you may note on this particular tree near GZ). Horsechestnut bark is scaly and the twigs are not malodorous when broken, Sweet has smooth bark in general and the twigs are not malodorous when broken, and finally the Ohio has rough bark and twigs are strongly malodorous when broken. The buds are gummy, smooth and ridged in the same order.
Once again we will be doing "Cache In, Trash Out" on this find, so please do your Schenley Park Rangers a service by picking up one piece of trash on your way out of the park after getting your smiley face!