214 AMERICAN FOREST TREES 



annual rings are often nearly invisible, because the pores are scattered evenly and do 

 not form bands. The medullary rays are broad, in the heart black, in the sapwood 

 white. If the wood were otherwise suitable, pleasing effects might be produced by 

 quarter-sawing, but as far as known, no attempts have been made to do this. Now 

 and then a suitable log might be found. The importance of this oak lies in its fuel 

 value. It rates above white oak in theoretical tests, but it is heavier in ash, and 

 in practice it hardly measures up to white oak. It grows slowly and is destined to 

 disappear as a source of fuel supply. Reproduction has nearly ceased in most parts 

 of its range, due largely to the perseverance of hogs in eating the acorns. Cordwood 

 cutters have stripped the last tree from large areas where much once grew. This oak 

 never forms forests. The trees seldom grow as close together as apple trees in an 

 orchard. 



GAM BEL OAK (Qttercus gambelii) was destined by nature to occupy an inferior 

 place in the country's timber resources. It occupies a region of stunted vegetation 

 among the dry mountains and plateaus of the Southwest, and except where it grows 

 in better situations than usual, it is too small to be properly called a tree. It is at its 

 best among the mountains of southeastern Arizona where it grows in canyons that 

 can maintain a little damp soil. There it occasionally reaches a height of thirty feet 

 and a diameter of a foot or less. In most other parts of its range it is simply a 

 tangled, sprawling thicket of brush, covering the dry, rocky mountain ridges, and 

 along the bases of cliffs. It is found from Colorado to western Texas, and westward 

 into Utah, Nevada, and Arizona. The leaves are small, thick, firm, and hairy, 

 typical of desert foliage which must husband the scant water supply. The acorns are 

 pretty large for a tree so stunted, and they are tempting bait for birds and rodents of 

 the region. The acorns are sweet. If this oak's reproduction depended on acorns 

 alone it is doubtful if it would hold its ground in the face of perpetual adversity; but its 

 roots send up distorted and stunted sprouts which cover the ground, affording hiding 

 places for the few acorns which escape their hungry enemies. Man puts this oak to 

 few uses. It affords a pretty good class of fuel for camp fires, but cordwood cutters 

 cannot make much out of it. In rare instances frontier ranches use a few of the 

 unshapely poles for corral fences, but only as a case of last resort. The names 

 bestowed upon the tree by those who know it best are uncomplimentary. They call 

 it shin oak, pin oak, scrub oak, mountain oak, and Rocky Mountain oak. 



