Populus tremuloides usually grows between 6,000 and 8,000 feet but can grow up to 11,000 feet. Aspens are usually found in damp places along watercourses. Trunks are straight and topped with small high open crowns. The bark is smooth and light on young trees becoming darker with furrows on older trees. The bark does not peel. Leaves are nearly round, about 2 inches in diameter, and fringed with marginal teeth. Leaf blades are attached to twigs by long slender leaf stalks, which act as pivots so that the leaves quake in the breeze. Flowers appear before the leaves and produce cottony seeds. Aspens rarely reproduce by seeds in this region. Most new trees are clones of the parents, produced by root sprouts. Aspens grow in groves, which turn the hillsides golden in the fall. They are usually short lived, 100-200 years, due to heart rot fungus.
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