User:MarryamZ83/sandbox

Platanus racemosa article draft - the citation numbers I have here do not align with the citations in the article as these sources are the ones I found and I did not include the sources from the previous editor's. This caused the citation numbers to differ across my sandbox and the P. racemosa article.

Description
Depending on the sex, the inflorescence can either be red, if female, or chartreuse, if male. After the female clusters fertilize, the achenes bear a fruit that breaks apart and scatters just as the tree's pollen does.

Both older bark and twigs on this plane sycamore become darker with time. The twigs and bark range from a light brownish gray to a shade resembling the color sepia. The lifespan often extends to 200 years unless damaged by disease or cut down by humans.

The height of these trees ranges from 10 to 35 meters.

Uses
California sycamores are hold wood that is hard to chop yet it's wood can still be employed to create a variety of items such as buttons, tobacco boxes, furniture, wooden utensils, barrels, and much more. California sycamores often grow in moist, warmer climates such as valleys or deserts and the wide, slanting branches of the tree provide shade from the heat. This western sycamore's shade cools the surrounding area while simultaneously offering a home for some animals in the humid environment in which it flourishes.

Ecology
Increased human interference has made the P. racemosa more susceptible to cross-breeding with other Platanus trees. This hybridization with other species like the P. x acerifolia offers the P. racemosa the advantage of resisting fungi diseases, namely the sycamore anthracnose. Interbred California sycamores are less vulnerable to this disease than the original P. racemosa as it harms their wood. However, sycamore anthracnose produces deadwood which creates a habitat for animals like wood ducks. The lack of non-hybridized P. racemosa thus harms the riparian woodlands in which they thrive.

Another disease that that the P. racemoa is particularly receptive to is the Fusarium dieback which is carried and passed on through two kinds of invasive ambrosia beetles. Removing the tree itself is one way to prevent the significant harms of Fusarium dieback from spreading but a mixture of fungicides such as metconazole combined with an insecticide can additionally reduce the number of ambrosia beetles that vector this disease. Close monitoring is required in order to prevent a substantial beetle infestation from occurring as that would damage the tree to the point of needing removal.

Further hybridization between the P. racemosa and P. x hispanica are a threat to the genetic diversity and identity of the former. The disease combatant advantage that the hybrid provides can bring about a decline in the native tree. The ensuing decline and genetic disintegration could not only harm the tree itself, but nesting birds, monarch butterflies, and numerous other small animals that reside or find shelter within the California sycamore's shade. D. Whitlock's study on the RNA of the Platanus trees near the Sacramento river reveals P. racemosa contains genes from P. x hispanica, which consequently demonstrates the increased erasure of the former.