Renowned for its brilliant clear yellow autumn foliage, the Tulip Tree is a strong, tall, fast-growing tree that bears unique tulip-shaped blooms of limey-yellow flowers with orange banded tepals. The tree’s distinctive mid-green four-lobed leaves, lighter underneath, are an added attraction to the large, showy flowers that appear amidst them when the tree reaches 6-7 years old. Tulip trees have an upright, pyramidal habit when young, spreading to oval as they age. One of the tallest tree species in its native North America, the strong, columnar trunks were regularly used by native Americans to cut out canoes. Fast growth rate.