FAGACE^ 253 



10. Quercus Catesbaei Michx. Turkey Oak. 



Leaves oblong or obovate or nearly triangular, gradually narrowed and cuneate at base, 

 deeply divided by wide rounded sinuses into 3 or 5 or rarely 7 lobes, the terminal lobe 

 ovate, elongated, acute and entire or repand-dentate, or obovate and coarsely equally or 

 irregularly 3-toothed at apex, the lateral lobes spreading, usually falcate, entire and acute, 

 tapering from the broad base, and broad, oblique, and repand-lobulate at apex, or 3- 

 toothed at the broad apex and gradually narrowed to the base, coated when they unfold 

 with rufous fascicled hairs, and when fully grown thick and rigid, bright yellow-green 

 and lustrous above, paler, lustrous, and glabrous below, with large tufts of rusty hairs in 

 the axils of the veins, 3'-12' long, 1/-10' wide, but usually about 5' long and wide, with a 

 broad yellow or red-brown midrib; turning bright scarlet before falling in the late autumn 

 or early winter; petioles stout, grooved, j'-f in length. Flowers: staminate in slender 

 hairy red-stemmed aments 4 '-5' long; calyx puberulous and divided into 4 or 5 ovate 

 acute lobes; pistillate on short stout tomentose peduncles, their involucral scales bright 

 red, pubescent, hairy at the margins; stigmas dark red. Fruit short-stalked, usually soli- 

 tary; nut oval, full and rounded at the ends, about I' long and f broad, dull light brown, 



Fig. 232 



covered at the apex by a thin coat of snow-white tomentum, inclosed for about one third 

 its length in a thin turbinate cup often gradually narrowed into a stout stalk-like base, light 

 red-brown and lustrous on the inner surface, covered by ovate-oblong rounded scales 

 extending above the rim of the cup and down over the upper third of the inner surface, 

 and hoary-pubescent except their thin bright red margins. 



A tree, usually 20-30, or occasionally 50-60 high, with a trunk rarely exceeding 2 

 in diameter, stout spreading more or less contorted branches forming a broad or narrow 

 open irregular generally round-topped head, and stout branchlets coated at first with 

 fascicled hairs, nearly glabrous and deep red when the leaves are half grown, dark red in 

 their first winter, gradually growing dark brown; generally much smaller and sometimes 

 shrubby. Winter-buds elongated, acute, \' long, with light chestnut-brown scales erose 

 on the thin margins, and coated, especially toward the point of the bud, with rusty pubes- 

 cence. Bark \'-\' thick, red internally, dark gray tinged with red on the surface, and at 

 the base of old trunks becoming nearly black, deeply and irregularly furrowed and broken 

 into small appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, strong, rather close-grained, light brown 

 tinged with red, with thick lighter colored sapwood; largely used for fuel. 



Distribution. Dry barren sandy ridges and sandy bluffs and hummocks in the neighbor- 

 hood of the coast; southeastern Virginia (near Zuni, Isle of Wight County) to the shores 



