164 CUPULIFER&. [ QUERCUS 



toothed. Staminodes minute or none. Ovary after fecundation 

 more or less perfectly 3-celled, rarely 4-5-celled ; styles 3-5, short, 

 ovules 2 in each cell. Fruit, an ovoid globose or depressed 1 -celled 

 nut, seated on or enclosed in and attached by its broad base or by 

 its whole surface to an involucre of imbricating hard bracts. 

 Seeds 1-2, testa membranous, cotyledons plano-convex, thick, 

 fleshy, smooth, grooved, lobed or ruminate, radicle minute. Species 

 about 300, in temperate and tropical regions. There are no wild 

 oaks in S. India or Ceylon, and the genus is absent from S. America, 

 Trop. and S. Africa and Australia. 



a. incana, Roxb. Hort. Beng. 104 ; Fl Ind. Hi, 642 ; Brandis 

 For. FL 482 ; Ind. Trees 626 ; F. S. I. v, 603 ; Watt E. D. ; Comm. 

 Prod. Ind. 911 ; King in Ann. Bot. Gard. ii, 26, t. 20 ; Kanjildl 

 For. Fl. (ed. 2), 402 ; Gamble Man. 675 ; Collett FL Siml, 475. 

 Vern. Ban, banj (N. W. Him.). White or grey oak. 



A medium-sized or large evergreen tree up to 80 ft. high ; young shoots 

 hoary or woolly. Leaves coriaceous, pinkish when young and woolly 

 all over, 3-6 in. long, oblong or ovate -lanceolate, acuminate, mucro- 

 nate-serrate, glabrous above, densely white-tomentose beneath ; 

 main lateral nerves 14-20 pairs, straight, parallel, prominent beneath. 

 MALE flowers softly pubescent, in slender drooping catkins 2-4 in. 

 long. Perianth 4-5-lobed. Anthers glabrous. FEM. flowers axillary, 

 sessile, usually in clusters of 2-5. Styles linear- clavate, spreading. 

 Cup axillary, solitary or clustered, J in. in diam., embracing half the 

 conico-ovoid nut when ripe. Nut 1 in. long, white-tomentose 

 when young, at length glabrous and brown. 



Dehra Dun, in the Mothronwala swamp, at an elevation of 1,900 ft. A 

 few specimens of this tree planted many years ago on a shady spot in 

 the Government Garden at Saharanpur managed to survive the 

 tropical heat during several summers. DISTBIB. : W. Himalaya 

 from the Indus to Nepal at 2-8,000 ft. It also occurs in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Chitral in the N. W. Frontier Province, as well as on 

 the Punjab Salt range and on the Shan hills of Upper Burma. The 

 tree is very common on the outer ranges of the W. Himalaya and is 

 often gregarious. It is frequently associated with Rhododendron 

 arboreum, Pieris ovatifolia (ayar) and occasionally with deodar. The 

 wood is used as fuel and for making charcoal. The bark contains a 

 large percentage of tannin, and the leaves are much used as cattle 

 fodder 



