FORESTS AND HERBACEOUS FLORA OF LOWLANDS. 



87 



post oak, Southern shagbark hickory (Hicoria carolinae-septentrio- 

 nalis), black oak, Spanish oak, and more rarely black walnut, the last 

 becoming scarce wherever it is accessible. 



On these bench lands the white oak takes the place of the cow oak. 

 There can be little doubt that the largest supplies of white oak timber 

 in the State are preserved in these coves of the Tennessee Valley. 

 The full-grown trees average from 2 to 3 feet in diameter. Four 

 trees felled for investigation were of the following dimensions: 



Dimensions and age of white oak timber. 



Five or six trees of these dimensions have frequently been counted 

 upon an acre. 



The Southern shellbark or shagbark* hickory is also abundant in 

 these coves, and large quantities of this timber are annually shipped 

 to the manufacturing centers North and South. The saplings of this 

 tree form the greater part of the undergrowth in the more open forest. 



The Spanish oak (Qu&rcus digitata (Q. falcata Michx.)) is at its best 

 where the terraces merge into the lowland. Its sturdy trunk aver- 

 ages from 2 to 3 feet in diameter, with a total height of from 90 to 100 

 feet, affording clear sticks of timber 36 to 48 feet long. The age of 

 such trees of full growth varies between 135 and 175 years. 



The willow oak (Qu&rcus phellos) is most abundant in wet, undrained 

 flats of an impervious soil. In Alabama it is rarely found outside of 

 this valley, but extends sparingly southward to the Central Prairie 

 region. This oak seldom exceeds 80 feet in height, with an average 

 diameter breast high of 25 inches, and spreads its massive limbs at a 

 height of from 30 to sometimes 40 feet from the ground. 



The large amount of hardwood lumber sawn at the mills on the 

 banks of the Tennessee River (chiefly at Decatur) and at the numerous 

 smaller factories along the Memphis and Charleston Railroad exhibits 

 the rapid development of the industries depending upon the timber 

 wealth of the Tennessee Valley. 



Mesophile herbaceous plant associations. The herbaceous flora of the 

 forests of the bottom and bench lands comprises but a small number 

 of mesophile species growing under their dense shade. Late in autumn 

 the writer observed Chimaphila maculata and Galium circaezans, both 

 northern types extending to the Canadian zone, and also Mitchella 

 repens, common throughout temperate eastern North America. 



