Appearance
It is a small to medium-sized deciduous tree typically growing to 8–10 m tall, more rarely 20 m, and exceptionally to 28 m.The bark is smooth, silvery grey of young trees, becoming scaly pale grey-brown and occasionally fissured on old trees.
The shoots are green and variably hairy at first, becoming grey-brown and hairless; the buds are conspicuous, purple-brown, and often densely hairy.
The leaves are pinnate, 10–22 cm long and 6-12 cm broad, with 9–19 leaflets; each leaflet is 3–7 cm long and 15–23 mm broad, with a coarsely serrated margin; they are variably hairy, particularly the petiole and leaf veins on the underside.
The hermaphrodite flowers are produced in large terminal corymbs 8–15 cm diameter with up to 250 flowers, the individual flowers 1 cm diameter, with five creamy-white petals, and are insect pollinated. This occurs in May. The fruit is a small pome 6–9 mm diameter, green at first, ripening bright red in late summer, and containing up to eight small seeds.
Naming
Sometimes called "Mountain Ash", ''Sorbus'' is unrelated to the true Ash tree though the leaves are superficially similar.
Habitat
Rowan is very tolerant of cold and is often found at high altitude on mountains; in the UK it occurs at up to 1000 m altitude, higher than any other tree, and in France up to 2000 m.It is very tolerant of a wide range of soil conditions, including thin acid soils and cracks in cliffs. It also fairly frequently grows as an epiphyte in clefts or cavities of larger trees such as Scots Pines, though epiphytic specimens rarely have growing conditions adequate for them to reach maturity.
The fruit is an important food resource for many birds, notably Redwings, Fieldfares, Blackbirds, Mistle Thrushes and Waxwings, which in turn disperse the seeds in their droppings. The seeds are eaten by Pine Grosbeaks and other large finches. The fruit is also known as rowan berries. These berries provide high pH or acid and well-drained soils that keep stress to a minimum.
Predators
The foliage and bark is eaten by Red Deer, Roe Deer, and Mountain Hares, and a small number of insect larvae, including the moth ''Venusia cambrica'', the case-bearer moth ''Coleophora anatipennella'' and leaf-miners of genus ''Stigmella''. The snail ''Helix aspersa'' also feeds on the leaves.
Cultural
The Sorbus Aucuparia is also known as the rowan, mountain-ash, wittern,whitty, wiggen, and quickbeam. It is believed to have protective magical powers again different kinds of witchcraft. This was a common belief in Britain. Rowan twigs were placed over the bed in Lancashire to give a person peaceful sleep. In some places, such as North Yorkshire, people made "witch wood" out of rowan twigs and placed them above beds and doorways to ward off witches.In the United Kingdom, where it is often known as the ''wiggen tree'', the Mountain Ash has traditionally been used as an anti-witching device.
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