Donna Richoux wrote:

Mike Lyle wrote:

Note two-group posting: I hope nobody will mind.

European readers will be familiar with tamarisks as robustly
salt-tolerant but innocent seaside trees or shrubs; US readers, I find
from sci.botany, may know the various species as unstoppable invaders
in certain conditions. At
http://internet.cybermesa.com/~bludevil/P6160002.JPG
the attractive name "salt cedar" is given as an alternative.

Does anybody know the pedigree of the new, presumably American, name?
What is the oldest printed use we have? It's not in OED1, where
*tamarisk" is cited from 1400.

The Dictionary of American English (1938) gives two citations for "salt
cedar," one from 1881, the other 1895 (that one refers to the coast of
Texas and southern California).

OED2 also has 1881 as the earliest citation (from Harper's Magazine).
Depending which government site you believe, tamarisk/saltcedar was
first imported to the US in either 1837 or the 1850s:

http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/1999/990708.htm
http://www.nps.gov/whsa/tamarisk.htm