UPDATE. Turns out that I'm quite wrong about this. After asking a friend who knows a lot more about botany than I do (nil) and discovering that she did not recall any of the Mod Quad trees being dogwoods, I did further research. Turns out they're hawthorns. Several hawthorns smell disgusting in May. Some, however, don't smell so bad, which explains the similar looking but better smelling trees around the guard box. Looks like this case is closed.
I know I have not written in a long time. Unfortunately things are busy with summer class, internships, and all that, but while studying for tomorrow's class I discovered something that I have been wanting to figure out for a while. I thought I'd take a small break and share it.
Late spring and summer at Notre Dame was generally a pleasant time. Notre Dame had a lot of very beautiful trees, and I particularly enjoyed it when they began to flower, not only because of the pleasant view but also (in general) the pleasant odor, especially regarding the flowering dogwood trees, which I enjoyed not only because they're rather beautiful but also because they're the state flower of Missouri, my native state.
This general enjoyment, however, had no application to the region students called "North Quad" because those trees reeked. Every time I would walk to Pasquerilla East to visit my girlfriend, I would have to endure the rotting-fish stench of the what seemed to be flowering dogwood trees. The only difference I could notice since I did not want to spend any appreciable time in ammonia-town was black centers in the flowers instead of red. Because I was and still am not a botanist and at the time I did not have much time to be researching such questions, I put off the resolution of that issue.
Today, unexpectedly, I stumbled upon Wikipedia's article on the Pagoda Dogwood, which supposedly stinks to high heaven. I bet that's the stinky tree.
Though it's unfortunate that there was so much tree damage at the university due to a tornado that landed during commencement week, perhaps this will give the university the opportunity to replace those horrid trees with some flowering dogwoods, retaining the beauty of the scene and improving its smell at the same time.
