The Bur Oak. 



Another oak which is found in the state of New York and the 

 north, but not so commonly as the white oak, is the bur oak or 

 mossy-cup oak. 



The leaf in the center of the picture (figure 2) is the most common 

 form, but other shapes can be found. The bur oak is as variable 

 in the shapes of its leaves as the white oak is, but there are some 

 general features in common : the lobes are rounded as in the white 

 oak, but are placed in a different position and are more irregular. 

 Towards the tip, the leaf is very wavy or toothed, but further 



2. — Bur oak. 



down it is more likely to be lobed and sometimes very deeply 

 lobed. The general form is somewhat obovate, but is narrower 

 towards the stem than in the white oak. A leaf shaped and lobed 

 like the two at the right, and downy on the lower surface or else paler 

 than on the upper, is almost certainly a bur oak leaf. But if it is 

 anything hke the left-hand leaf, find an acorn. If the acorn 

 is like the one in the picture, having the cups covered with 

 thick pointed scales, sometimes as coarse as these, sometimes smaller, 

 and the edge bordered with a fringe of narrow scales, it was borne 

 on a bur oak. The bark of the bur oak is light gray, like that of the 

 white oak; but a little darker and not so scaly. Usually, too, its 

 branches are not so horizontal. That which marks it best as being a 

 bur oak is the character of the bark on those branches which are 



