Silver Birch woods

Medium-sized deciduous tree, typically reaching 15–25 m tall, with a slender trunk usually under 40 cm diameter (exceptionally to 1 m diameter), and a crown of arched branches with drooping branchlets. The bark is white, often with black diamond-shaped marks or larger patches, particularly at the base. The shoots are rough with small warts, and hairless, and the leaves 3–7 cm long, triangular with a broad base and pointed tip, and coarsely double-toothed serrated margins. The flowers are wind-pollinated catkins, produced before the leaves in early spring, the small (1–2 mm) winged seeds ripening in late summer on pendulous, cylindrical catkins 2–4 cm long and 7 mm broad.