i^ 



38 



SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 



CUPULIFER^ 



lobe is obovate and deeply three-lobed with rounded lobes^ or ovate and sometimes elongated and rounded 

 and frequently emarginate at the apex, or rarely it is entirely suppressed and the broad apex of the leaf 

 is truncate or emarginate ; the lateral lobes are oblique^ broadly obovate, rounded or emarginate at the 

 apex, undulate or concave in outline on the upper margin, and furnished on the lower with a large lobe 

 deeply emarginate or irregularly lobed at the broad apex ; the basal lobes generally widen gradually 

 from the bottom and then spread abruptly into small ovate rounded or slightly emarginate lobes^ or are 

 sometimes nearly triangular with undulate entire margins ; on some trees in the southern states all the 

 leaves are three-lobed at the apex with short broad rounded or pointed lobes, and are Avedge-shaped and 

 entire or undulate below ; on many of the leaves of other trees the basal lobes are suppressed and the 

 lateral lobes are very oblique, narrow, entire, and rounded at the apex ; and occasionally a few individual 

 leaves are oblong or oval and entire, or furnished on one side with a small entire lobe; when they 

 unfold the leaves are dark red above, especially toward the apex ; soon losing a large part of their dense 

 pubescent covering, at maturity they are thick and firm, deej) dark green on the upper surface^ which 

 is roughened with pale scattered stellate hairs, and covered on the lower surface with gray or light 

 yellow or rarely silvery white pubescence, and before falling in the autumn they turn dull yellow or 

 brown ; they are usually four or five inches long and three or four inches across the upper lateral lobes, 

 although they vary from two to eight inches in length and from an inch and a half to five inches in 

 width ; their midribs are broad^ light-colored, and pubescent on the upper and tomentose or pubescent 

 on the lower side ; the veins which run to the points of the upper lateral lobes are much stouter than 

 the others, and the lateral veins are arcuate and united near the margins and connected by conspicuous 

 coarsely reticulate veinlets ; the stout pubescent jDctioles are slightly flattened on the U23per side and from 

 half an inch to nearly an inch in length.^ The stipules are brown, scarious^ pubescent^ and ciliate on the 

 margins with long pale hairs, and obovate, rounded or acute at the apex ; they are half an inch long 

 and from one sixteenth to one eighth of an inch broad on the first leaves of the season^ and^ becoming 



gradually narrow, are linear on those at the end of the brand 



The flowers appear when the 



are about a third grown, from March in Texas to the end of May at the north ; the staminate flowers 

 are borne in aments three or four inches long and are produced from the axils of ovate acute hairy 

 bracts rather longer than the hirsute yellow calyx, which is usually divided into five ovate acute lacini- 

 ately cut segments ; the anthers are emarginate^ yellow, and covered with short scattered pale hairs. 

 The pistillate flowers are sessile or pedunculate and covered with pale hairs ; the stigmas are bright red. 

 The acorns are usually sessile or occasionally short-pedunculate ; ^ the nut is oval or ovate or ovate- 

 oblong, broad at the base, obtuse and naked or covered with pale persistent pubescence at the apex, 

 from one half of an inch to an inch long, and from one quarter to three quarters of an inch broad, and 

 is sometimes striate with dark longitudinal stripes ; the cup is cup-shaped or turbinate, or rarely saucer- 

 shaped, and usually incloses from one third to one half of the nut, although rarely it is very shallow, 

 embracing only the base of the nut ; it is pale and pubescent on the inner and pale and tomentose on 

 the outer surface, which is covered with thin free ovate scales rounded or acute at the apex, reddish 

 brown, and sometimes, toward the rim of the cup, ciliate on the margins with long pale hairs. 



1 In the northern and middle states the leaves of Quercus minor ^ Near Austin, Texas, individual trees of Quercus minor produce 



are quite constantly five-lobed with broad three-lobed or entire acorns with large broadly ovate nuts pubescent at the apex and 



terminal lobes and two broad lateral lobes separated by wide inclosed nearly to the middle in deep turbinate cups (Plate ccclxix. 



sinuses from the small basal lobes. In the south, however, the f. 5), while the acorns of others growing with them have ovate 



leaves are often extremely variable on the same or on different oblong narrow glabrous nuts and shallow saucer-shaped cups (Plate 



individuals, and in a small grove of these trees on limestone soil ccclxix. f. 6). I have not seen such acorns in other parts of the 



near Austin, Texas, I found leaves varying from what may be country on this species, which usually produces short oval nuts 



called the normal five-lobed form to trifid, one-lobed, undulate and about half an inch in length and cup-shaped or slightly turbinate 



entire, or subentire forms, and from two to five inches in length cups. In all the forms of fruit the cup-scales are thin and remark- 

 (Plate ccclxix. f. 1, 2,3). Trees with rather thin trifid leaves seven 



3 



ably homomorphous, and no other North American "White Oak 

 or eight inches long and four or five inches wide I have seen only appears to vary so little in the character of the cup-scales, 

 near Mobile, Alabama, where they grow side by side with those ^ Xwo trees discovered by Dr. J. H. Mellichamp near Bluffton, 



bearing leaves of the normal shape (Plate ccclxix. f. 4). South Carolina, several years ago, but now destroyed, were consid- 



