294 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



QUERCUS LANUGINOSA, Pubescent Oak 



Quercus lanuginosa, Thuillier, Flora Envir. Paris, ed. 2, 502 (1799). 



Quercus pubescens, Willd. 1^. Pi. iv. 450 (1805). 



Quercus Robur sessiliflora, var. lanuginosa, DC. Prod. xvi. 2, p. 10 (1864). 



Quercus sessiliflora, Salisbury, va.x. pubescens, Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. iii. 1736 (1838). 



A small tree, rarely attaining 60 feet in height, and often, in the wild state, 

 a dense shrub with a twisted stem. Bark rather rougher and more scaly than that 

 of the common oak. Twigs and buds densely pubescent, the scales of the latter 

 being ciliate on the margin and pubescent all over their surface. Leaves small, about 

 3 inches long, variable in shape, wrinkled in margin, cuneate or cordate at the base, 

 with four to eight pairs of rounded lobes variable in depth ; always densely pubescent 

 underneath ; petiole tomentose, \ to i inch long. Axis of male flowers pubescent. 

 Female flowers with sessile stigmas and tomentose ovary. Fruits, one to four, 

 crowded on a short thick stalk, or sessile ; cups tomentose and often tubercular. 



This oak occurs on dry soils, especially those of limestone formation, in the 

 south of France, Corsica, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Alsace, south Baden, Thuringia, 

 Austria, Hungary, southern and western Switzerland, Turkey, Greece, Crimea, 

 Caucasus, and Asia Minor. In Provence it forms dense, low thickets covering 

 extensive areas of the very dry lower parts of the limestone mountains. In Corsica 

 it appears to be the only deciduous species of oak ; and was seen by me forming 

 scattered groves in the mountains below the zone of Pinus Laricio, at about 2000 

 feet elevation. I observed no trees larger than a foot in diameter ; and it is evident 

 that it is very distinct from Q. sessiliflora, which, if it. occurred, would grow to a 

 large size in the Corsican humid climate. The tree is of no importance in Corsica 

 as a source of timber ; and Mr. Rotges of the forest service considered that it should 

 always be treated as coppice. 



It produces hybrids with both Q. sessiliflora and Q. pedunculata, and differs 

 markedly from both these species in its habit of producing root-suckers, and more- 

 over the bark is different. 



Loudon incorrectly states that it occurs in the New Forest, and Sussex. There 

 is a tree of this form growing at Syon with a remarkably curved bole of about 

 18 feet long and 5 feet 10 inches in girth. If upright this tree might have been 

 50 feet high. Elwes has seen this species growing wild in the forest of Fontaine- 

 bleau, which Hickel informed him was about its northern limit as a wild tree ; here 

 it is usually small and stunted, so far as he saw, and of no economic value. 



Varieties of Quercus lanuginosa 



I. Var. Hartwissiana, Hort.^ Leaves with six or seven pairs of lobes, which 

 are mucronate at the tips. 



' According to Schneider, Laubholzkundt, 194 (19O4), the plant so named by Steven in Bull. Soc. Nat. Mosc. 1857, 



