Trees Growing at Our Pleasant Hill Oregon Home

Common Horse Chestnut

Aesculus hippocastanum Native to north Greece and Albania and long cultivated in other parts of Europe in parks, gardens, and greens, where children gather the nuts, or conkers, to play their game of "conqueror". May grow to more than 100 feet. Flowers are white with a yellow turning to red patch on the petal bases and form clusters up to 12 inches tall. Fruit have hard spines, are about 2 1/4 inches across, and split in October to release one or two of the familiar shiny brown conkers. We have about 10 of these. We planted the conkers from a tree on Stan Smith home in nearby Dexter. They have grown to about 6 inches high in a month.