188 



TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



9. Carya alba K. Koch. Hickory. 



Leaves glandular, resinous, fragrant, 8'-12' long, with petioles covered like the rachis 

 and the under surface of the leaflets with fascicled hairs, and 5 or 7 oblong-lanceolate to ob- 

 ovate-lanceolate leaflets gradually or abruptly acuminate, mostly equilateral, equally or 

 unequally rounded or cuneate at base, minutely or coarsely serrate, sessile or short- 

 stalked, dark yellow-green and rather lustrous above, lustrous, paler or light orange- 

 colored or brown on the lower surface, the upper leaflets 5' -8' long and 3'-5' wide, and 

 two or three times as large as those of the lowest pair. Flowers : staminate in aments 

 4'-5' long, with slender light green stems coated with fascicled hairs, pale yellow- 

 green, scurfy-pubescent, with elongated ovate-lanceolate bracts ending in tufts of long 

 pale hairs, and three or four times as long as the calyx-lobes; stamens 4, with oblong 

 bright red hirsute anthers; pistillate in crowded 2-5-flowered spikes, slightly contracted 

 above the middle, coated with pale tomentum, the bract ovate, acute, sometimes ' 

 long, about twice as long as the broadly ovate nearly triangular bractlets and calyx- 

 lobes; stigmas dark red. Fruit ellipsoidal or obovoid, gradually narrowed at the ends, 

 acute at apex, abruptly contracted toward the base, rarely obovoid with a stipe-like base 



Fig. 178 



(var. ficoides Sarg.), or ovoid with a long acuminate apex (var. ovoidea Sarg.), pilose or 

 nearly glabrous, dark red-brown, If '-2' long, with a husk about i' thick splitting to the 

 middle or nearly to the base; nut nearly globose, ellipsoidal, obo void-oblong or ovoid, 

 narrowed at ends, rounded at base, acute, and sometimes attenuated and long-pointed at 

 apex, much or only slightly compressed, obscurely or prominently 4-ridged, light reddish 

 brown, becoming darker and sometimes red with age, with a very thick hard shell and 

 partitions; in drying often cracking transversely; seed small, sweet, dark brown, and 

 lustrous. 



A tree, rarely 100 high, usually much smaller, with a tall trunk occasionally 3 in 

 diameter, comparatively small spreading branches forming a narrow or often a broad round- 

 topped head of upright rigid or of gracefully pendulous branches, and stout branchlets 

 clothed at first with pale fascicled hairs, rather bright brown, nearly glabrous or more or 

 less pubescent, and marked by conspicuous pale lenticels during their first season, be- 

 coming light or dark gray, with pale emarginate leaf-scars almost equally lobed, or elon- 

 gated with the lowest lobe two or three times as long as the others. Whiter-buds: ter- 

 minal broadly ovoid, acute or obtuse, f '-f ' long, two or three times as large as the axillary 

 buds, the three or four outer bud-scales ovate, acute, often keeled and apiculate, thick and 

 firm, dark reddish brown and pilose, usually deciduous late in the autumn, the inner scales 



