Identifying Trees: By Leaf, Bark, Buds and Phone Photo

To identify a tree, start with the leaf - needles or broad leaves, opposite or alternate, simple or compound - and then confirm with the fruit, bark and buds. University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension's forestry guide works through the same features in that order: habitat and form, leaves, fruit and cones, bark, and buds.

The order matters because each answer cuts the list sharply. Needles rule out every broadleaf tree. Opposite branching, on Wisconsin's list, points to a small group that includes maples and ashes.

A phone photo can shortcut this, but take it with the same features in mind: a leaf flat against a plain background, the underside, a close-up of where the leaf joins the twig, the bark at chest height, and any fruit or cones.

Conifers. Wisconsin's guide separates conifers first by the needle - shape, sharp or soft tip, and how many sit together in a bundle. White pines carry needles in bundles of five; red and jack pines in bundles of two. It also flags special cases: tamarack, a conifer that is deciduous and drops its needles, as well as hemlock, northern white-cedar and eastern red cedar.

Broadleaf trees. Four questions do most of the work:

• Arrangement. Opposite branching means twigs and leaves come off in pairs on opposite sides of the branch, which Wisconsin gives for maples and ashes; most other broadleaf trees are alternate.
• Simple or compound. A compound leaf is made of leaflets - Wisconsin's range is as few as three to as many as twenty or more - on one stalk.
• Lobes. In oaks, pointed lobes indicate the red oak group and rounded lobes the white oak group.
• Edges. Smooth or toothed margins, and how deep the gaps between lobes run, separate similar species.

In winter, or on a tall tree where the leaves are out of reach, the other features take over.

• Bark. Wisconsin's examples: peeling bark on birches, shaggy strips on hickory, warty bark on hackberry, and blocky bark on mature black cherry. Its guide also asks you not to carve into trees or peel bark off unless you are trained.
• Buds. The terminal bud at the tip of a twig is the largest and most distinctive; colour, shape and the pattern of bud scales separate species. The leaf scar left where last year's leaf fell is a second clue.
• Fruit and cones. Acorns, winged samaras, pods, berries and cone shape all narrow the field. Wisconsin uses cone characteristics to separate white spruce from black spruce.
• Twigs. Colour, texture and thorns.

Fruit and fallen leaves under the tree are fair evidence too - photograph them next to the trunk so you know they came from that tree.

A dichotomous key asks one either-or question at a time until one tree is left. Three free ones cover most readers in North America:

• Arbor Day Foundation. An illustrated, step-by-step key that identifies a tree by its leaves; you begin by choosing your region. The foundation also publishes a tree guide covering more than 200 trees and shrubs.
• OPLIN 'What Tree Is It?' Published by the Ohio Public Library Information Network with the Ohio Historical Society and maintained since 1997, it lets you identify by leaf, by fruit or by name.
• University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension. Its tree identification page walks through each feature and links to herbarium keys from UW-Stevens Point and UW-Green Bay and to a Wisconsin DNR urban tree guide.

Keys are slower than an app but they teach you the features, so the next tree takes less time.

Yes, with limits worth knowing. University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension says tree identification apps continue to improve but are often incorrect, especially for understory plants, with accuracy ranging from 30 to 80 percent and PictureThis performing best in the comparisons it cites. Its advice is to confirm app identifications with an expert.

The most-cited recent app test does not settle the question for trees. The 2023 PLOS ONE study by Campbell, Peacock and Bacon tested six apps, including Google Lens, on 38 herbaceous species; trees and other woody plants were not included. What it did find applies to any plant: every app did better on flowers than on leaves.

So for a tree, give the app more than one leaf. Photograph a leaf on both sides, the twig showing how leaves are arranged, the bark and any fruit, and check the answer against the leaf questions above. Our photo guide covers lighting and framing.

Research and drafting for this page were done with the help of AI, and every figure was then checked line by line against the sources listed at the end of the page. Sources were opened on 2026-09-25. If you find a mistake, tell us and we will correct it.