1292 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



QUERCUS SUBER, Cork Oak 



Quercus Suber, Linnaeus, Sp. PI. 995 (1753); Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. iii. 191 1 (1838); 



Willkomm, Forstliche Flora, 424 (1887); Coutinho, in Bull. Soc. Brot. vi. 82 (1888); 



Mathieu, Flore Forestiire, 377 (1897). 

 Quercus suberosa, Salisbury, Prod. 392 (1796). 

 Quercus Bivoniana, Gussone, Fl. Sicul. Syn. ii. 604 (1844). 



A tree, attaining 60 ft. in height and 20 ft. in girth, usually much smaller. 

 Bark thick and corky, occasionally becoming a foot in thickness on old trunks, 

 which are deeply fissured. Young branchlets covered with a dense greyish 

 tomentum, retained in the second year. Leaves (Plate 339, Fig. 63) coriaceous, per- 

 sistent two or three years, often convex above and concave beneath, about 2 in. 

 long and 1^ in. wide, variable in shape, ovate or oval, acute or rounded at the apex, 

 unequal at the base ; with about six pairs of lateral nerves, all but the lowest one 

 or two pairs, ending in a minute mucronate tooth ; upper surface bright green, 

 glabrescent ; lower surface covered with a dense grey tomentum ; petiole, \ to 

 in. long, tomentose. 



Fruit in the typical form, ripening in the first year, solitary or in pairs on short 

 stout grey tomentose axillary peduncles ; acorn f to 1 in. long, variable in shape, 

 glabrous, with a tomentose apical umbo ; cupule turbinate, to f in. in diameter at 

 the rim, covered with grey tomentose scales, reddish at the tips, ovate and short in 

 the basal ranks, long linear and mostly erect in the upper half of the cupule. 



Var. occidentalis. 



Quercus occidentalis, Gay, in Ann. Sc. Nat. vi. 243 (1856), and in Bull. Soc. Bot. Frame, iv. 449 

 (1857); Mathieu, Flore Forestiire, 384 (1897). 



Leaves deciduous in June of the following year, when the next season's leaves 

 are already developed. Fruit ripening in the second year ; cupules hemispherical, 

 with appressed ovate obtuse grey tomentose scales, red at their tips. 



This variety is the only form of the cork oak in the south-west of France, and 

 is also found on the coast of Portugal, where according to Coutinho, 1 the distinction 

 between it and the type disappears, acorns of both kinds being found on the same 

 tree. There the cork oaks flower continuously from January to April. The acorns 

 produced by the first flowers either ripen in September or in October and November, 

 two distinct crops being noticeable. The acorns produced by the last flowers of the 

 season are stopped in their growth by the winter cold, and ripen in the following 

 year, constituting a third crop. The latter, according to Coutinho, have cupules 

 with scales similar to those of Q. occidentalis in the Landes. 



This variety is, however, considerably hardier than the type, as plantations made 

 in Brittany in 1826 with acorns from the Landes succeeded, while those made with 



1 Daveau, who had much experience in Portugal as well as in Provence, in a pamphlet, Note sitr U Q. occidentalis, 

 ex Ann. Soc. Hort. Hlrault (Montpellier, 1 899), confirms the opinions of Coutinho. 



