HelpfulGardener.com

I bought a Ginkgo tree for sentimental reasons: I grew up where Ginkgo was planted as avenue of street trees and used to climb them as a child (I was a tree hugger even then )

Now, as I'm researching the best location on my property to plant it, I keep seeing references that Ginkgo is native to China. Yet, there is a "Ginkgo Petrified Forest" in Washington State -- apparently the only fossil evidence in the world. "History explains that Ginkgo trees used to inhabit much of the earth, but eventually were left to caretakes in Japan and China. Nowhere in the world are prehistoric ginkgo trees discovered other than right here in Washington State." (These statements are kind of contradictory -- maybe there are leaf print fossils elsewhere?)

So, what about N.E./Mid-Atlantic U.S.A.? If it "used to inhabit much of the earth" can I give it an "honorary" native status?

I understand that the Ginkgo biloba was to be found in many parts of the old world (remembering that the continents were not divided as now) going back some 200 million years; certainly in the Jurassic period.
The remaining are to be found cultivated around the many temples in China.
As they were so widespread I would think it legitimate for many populations to claim them as native as they were likely to have been at one time.

I see no reason why you can't bestow honaray native status on the Ginko. Ginko is oone of the oldest trees surviving from prehistoric times relatively unchanged. (Sorry don't know my geologic time references.)

Some other interesting info.... Ginko is a conifer... joining the Metasequoia Taxodium and Larix genus' as deciduous. Also, female Ginkos are quite maloderous and most trees sold in nurseries are males to avoid the foul smelling fruit.

Ginkgo is not a conifer!

They have their very own division, Gingkophyta, with a single class, order, family, genus, and species below.

Give it the 'honorary native status'. Ginkgo was once a North American native a LONG time ago and more recently brought back from China.

I have heard people call Ginkgo a conifer- while they are mistaken, the Ginkgo, like conifers, is a gymnosperm (the seed is 'naked') as opposed to plants where the seed in enclosed (angiosperms).

Dawn Redwood is another great tree that was once native to North America and more recently brought over from China.