45.2 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



always a joy to the eye ; and for my 

 part I can not have too many of them ! 

 Its first cousin, the swamp white oak, 

 is quite different in its habits. You will 

 find it along stream and lake banks, in 

 rich creek bottoms anywhere where it 

 is never really dry occurring through- 

 out the northern half of our area. It 

 is as much a characteristic of low- 

 ground, water-inundated landscapes as 

 the red and silver maples, the king nut 

 hickory, the gums and ashes, and the 

 pin oak. So far as I know, nurserymen 

 have not attempted to grow it. but, as 



Fig. 61 Scarlet Oak. 'Q. coeclnea, Wang.) 



it will be an excellent sort to plant 

 where one has cleared some bottom land 

 of trash and thickets, it will be well to 

 grow some of its acorns in the seed 

 bed, for it stands transplanting nicely 

 and will yield you a fine timber classed 

 rignt in with white oak. It is not a 

 pretty tree, for its leaves turn direct 

 *o brown yellow in the autumn and its 

 branchlets sweep downward in dense 

 masses, giving the tree a shaggy appear- 

 ance. The bark is dark, in deep, rough, 

 regular seams. 



The post oak, second cousin of the 

 white, is easily told from it by its deep- 

 ly indented leaves, the leaf having a dis- 

 tinct waist so to speak, and its acorn 

 is smaller and rounder with the cup en- 

 closing half of the acorn, growing ses- 

 sile in pairs on the twigs, while the 

 swamp white oak acorns have a long 

 stem, though its acorn closely resem- 

 bles the white oak's which has no stem. 

 So there you have an easily remem- 

 bered identification, even though cer- 

 tain freaks among the leaves may be 

 enough alike to deceive one. The burr 



Fie. 3. Red Ok. (Q. rubr, L.) 



oak, next in line among the white oak 

 cousins, is the principal western repre- 

 sentative in its favorite location of rich 

 moist bottom lands. We do not see 

 many of them here in the east, but in 

 the Ohio and Wabash basins it is com- 

 mon, a magnificent tree, of wood equal 

 to the white oak in commercial quali- 

 ties. Its leaf looks like a cross between 

 the post oak and the white, having the 

 deep indentations of the post and the 

 numerous lobes of the white. They 

 have a handsome, glossy-green appear- 



