Description
Horse chestnut (scientific name: Aesculus chinensis Bunge): It is a deciduous tree, up to 25 meters high, with dark brown or gray-brown bark, small branches, cylindrical, yellow-brown or gray-brown, with light yellow lenticels. Winter buds are large and resinous. Palm-shaped compound leaves, composed of 5-7 leaflets, dark green on the top, glabrous, and glabrous on the bottom except for the sparse pilose at the base of the middle ribs and lateral veins when tender. The inflorescence is cylindrical, the main axis of the inflorescence is puberulent, and the floret is often composed of 5-10 flowers, extending in a flat and oblique direction, and puberulent. Flowers are polygamous, male and bisexual flowers are on the same plant, calyx is tubular-bell-shaped, petals 4, white, oblong obovate to oblong oblanceolate. The fruit is spherical or obovate, yellow-brown, without thorns, with dense spots. The seeds often develop 1-2 grains, nearly spherical, chestnut brown; the navel is white.
Horse chestnut seeds are edible, but they taste bitter when eaten directly. They need to be boiled in alkaline water before being edible. They taste like chestnuts. Starch can also be extracted. The fine wood can be used to make various utensils, the seeds can be used for medicine, and the oil can be used to make soap. The horse chestnut tree has a beautiful tree shape, a large and beautiful flower, and a strange fruit shape. It is a rare tree species for leaf, flower, and fruit viewing, and it is one of the world's famous ornamental tree species.
