It certainly does appear to be grafted, and my guess is that the rootstock may be Ulmus pumila. Since U. parvifolia can be propagated from cuttings, it seems odd that growers would resort to grafting using unrelated rootstock, but perhaps it's quicker to produce liners from grafts vs cuttings (or tissue culture).

David, my Allee II Chinese elm shows a characteristic where the peeling bark stops at waist level and more usual furrowed bark has established below that down to the base. This non-peeling furrowed bark area has just shown up last 10 yrs and is creeping slowly upward (the result of bark maturation?). You can see it in this pic from last year. I don't think that could be a graft line if it's creeping upward, and I admit this doesn't look like what you posted.

PS. This specimen has a very American elm form to it, more so than some American elms.

beng - that's really odd what your bark is doing, I haven't noticed that on any of the Chinese elms I've seen. The patent for Allee says, "The exfoliating patchy bark that develops on 1" to 2" diameter branches is present on the 3' diameter trunk, including the exposed surface roots", which is what I've observed. Here's a photo of a mature Allee from the Colesville Nursery website:

We've seen a fair amount of storm damage on Allee here in my area, enough that I'd recommend against planting it, unless frequent pruning/training can be provided to promote better branch structure. The patent, and other online descriptions, describe the habit of Allee as vase-shaped, and "taller than it is wide", which isn't consistent with my observations. The Allee's we've planted tended to be as wide or wider than tall.

"unless frequent pruning/training can be provided to promote better branch structure"

Yep, that's what I've been doing for the past 11 years since the ice storm damage woke me up to the problems of this cultivar.

I'd seen that pic at Colesville's website - it's where I bought the tree, after all! What's strange is, I simply cannot believe it took me so long to notice this. Beng reports this line 'moving up' his tree. It's contrary to what we generally know about grafts, but could something really odd be going on here where the rootstock meristem slowly engulfs the scion?

The branch structure of my Allee is visible in this picture that I considered posting to the fall color thread. It's the dark barked deciduous tree near the center, in front of the looming mass of Metasequoia 'Ogon'. That was a 30" whip in 2010!

You can see I managed to keep it mostly to a single trunk without many equal splits, but now I notice a spot about 1/2 way up (almost 30' high) where I'm tempted to reduce the branch to the right, that splits in a tripartate manner. Maybe by just removing two of the sub-branches to slow its growth. That's generally how I kept the rest of it from forming tight crotch angle splits. But I don't know, I'm going to be thinking about it. Might be time to leave it alone. I plan to rent a boom truck (or trailer) next spring to deal with a couple other branches that have gotten too high to reach by any other means. The huge maple to the right of it, probably close to 100', will be my last big tree removal, ever, probably...and I will definitely hire a professional for that. The culmination of 10s of thousands spent dealing with huge maples and some ashes over the past 20 years. It currently shades my most precious rare rhodies but in ~ 5 years, I hope things like the Larix (thin small line between the maple trunk and the edge of Metasequoia leaves) and Taxodium 'National Road' will take over those duties. And the 'Ogon' to the east will provide morning shade, of course. As previously argued elsewhere, if rhodies are happy, and mine are, they can take way more sun than most people expect. At least in my perma-humid summers.

The 'fluffy' red thing in the foreground is Cotinus 'Grace' and to the right of that is the Mexican X American dogwood that sometimes holds on as late as mid-December. The white specks to the left are a bunch of Camellia 'Survivor' flowers. The most foregrounded big simple green leaves are Magnolia 'Altas', which of course just turns an ugly brown in fall.

Note that this is a crop of a pic taken at 85mm equivalent, so is very compressed. The Metasequoia and Allee are about 75' apart.

Some pics of my Chinese Allee II elm. Several trunk pics and one of overall form. As I stated before, that area has slowly crept upward -- can even kinda see how it's doing that. Question: If an area of lower trunk "stops" peeling, would it not become thicker and more typical? I don't know.... Looking at that furrowed bark, it certainly isn't Siberian elm as I'm very familiar w/them.

But my question would by why is your pic so different from the Colesville pic? Which is a larger, older tree? I don't know Siberian elm but I've seen a lot of trees, generally (haha), and I've never seen trunk bark do anything like this. Super weird. No time right now but eventually want to go on a google images search to find other pics of Lacebark trunks.

Well, I may have to take something back -- some search-images of Siberian elm trunk do look a bit like that, tho the Sibs right near me have trunk bark alot lighter gray than what my Chinese elm looks like. But elms having similar trunk bark wouldn't be a stretch. Here's some google pics of Sib elm bark, tho the lighter-gray pics are what I see nearby.

https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=siberian+elm+bark&atb=v252-1&ia=images&iax=images

And then, a view of Chinese elm trunks.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=chinese+elm+bark&iar=images&t=ffab&atb=v252-1

beng - I concur with UBG that the bark on your tree is "super weird". I admit I haven't observed very many Lacebark Elms, but I don't think I've seen anything quite like that.

Searching a bit more online, I came across this photo of the graft on an Allee elm (from horticopia.net) taken by Dr Ed Gilman, Univ of Florida:

PS: My Chinese elm is near/about 20 yrs old -- a thin mail-order whip. There was about 8 yrs later a rampant scourge of elm-yellows that killed all the Sib-slippery elm hybrids (pure Sibs are resistant) and my Princeton Amer elm, and caused a number of cankers on the Chinese elm trunk, but it shook off and healed them, and nothing has since showed up again.

Upper bay- what a collection of trees. awesome

I've removed plenty of Ulmus pumila (Siberian elm) from my yard when I first moved here and have several still trying to take over the neighborhood in surrounding yards. But the bark on those is well furrowed all the way to the branch tips, even on the larger specimens.

Now one must remember that Ulmus parvifolia 'Corticosa' (corkbark elm) is a variety of the lacebark elm so in bengs case, could the furrowing bark, at the base of his tree, have something to do with its DNA producing similar kind of bark to the cork bark variety?

I haven't the experience or knowledge to make a call like that but just wondered if that might have something to do with it. Any educational ideas?

Since mine was sold as Allee II, I'd guess it's the same clone as other Allee IIs. But then there could be some difference from the Allee clone?

I do notice that Amer sycamores have shedding bark on branches, but the bottom trunk does not and is flaky or even alittle furrowing on it. Perhaps some kind of similar bark development/formation occurring there? I dunno....

Here's a good example of what I remarked on about sycamores.

There you have it!

Another mystery concerning weird things that can happen with trees.

And unless you're a botanist, does it really matter knowing the reason for it?

My horticultural hobby started here a little over 9 years ago.

More and more I'm less and less motivated, to plant things that take years and years to mature.

The only thing I can guess about this characteristic is that at some point (down at the base and moving upward), the bark begins to stop peeling off and so begins building up a layer like most non-peeling trees do. Perhaps that's what my Chinese elm is doing.

But the mystery is still why the Allee in the picture, in Georgia, looks like that. There's no sign of this other bark forming, and it's older.

Agree with UBG. Allee was selected for its ornamental bark character, which is maintained on the lower trunk and root flare, even in older trees.

"a rampant scourge of elm-yellows that ... caused a number of cankers on the Chinese elm trunk, but it shook off and healed them" I'm wondering if the cankers that developed but later "healed" on the trunk of beng's tree may have resulted in abnormal growth of the bark in those areas??

Arbor -- don't think so, because the cankers certainly didn't encompass that much area, and the furrowed bark started at the base, but the cankers were about chest height & another one about head high.

You have a point dave.

It's what happened 'under the bark' during the elm yellows that could've caused oddities later.

I've read that Alee ll can produce rough bark around the lower trunk that doesn't peel but I haven't been able to find any pictures of that happening.

When I was at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, I remember first time seeing large Chinese elms planted along a downtown street. I can't find those now on street view, but I see currently there are alot of younger ones in that general area. Found a couple worth posting, first one does seem to show the same type of base-bark that mine has.

Second one, bark isn't really shown enough, but it does show a quite broader form as mine, tho that may be because of being in a more open site.

Chinese elm at the MBG 4-28-25.

Appears to have a few years on it.

Appears to be the straight species.