264 TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



from New Jersey to Texas, and it is possible that Quercus heterophylla may, as many 

 botanists have believed, best be considered a species. 



X Quercus subfalcata Trel., believed to be a hybrid of Quercus Phellos and Q. rubra 

 has been found at Wickliffe, Ballard County, Illinois, at Campbell, Lawrence County, 

 Mississippi, Fulton, Hempstead County, Arkansas, and Houston, Harris County, Texas; 

 its var. microcarpa Sarg., probably of the same parentage, originated in a Dutch nursery. 



X Quercus ludoviciana Sarg., believed to be a hybrid of Quercus Phellos and Q. rubra 

 var. pagodoefolia grows in low wet woods ten miles west of Opelousas, St. Landry Par- 

 ish, Louisiana. 



18. Quercus laurifolia Michx. Laurel Oak. Water Oak. 



Leaves elliptic or rarely slightly broadest above the middle, acuminate at the ends, 

 apiculate at apex, occasionally lanceojate or oblong-obovate and rounded at apex (var. 

 hybrida Michx.) sometimes 3-lobed at apex, the terminal lobe acuminate, much larger 

 than the others (var. tridentata Sarg.), frequently unequally lobed on vigorous branches of 



Fig. 242 



young trees, with small nearly triangular lobes, when they unfold in spring yellow-green, 

 or later in the season often pink or bright red, and slightly puberulous, at maturity thin, 

 green, and very lustrous above, light green and less lustrous below, usually 3 '-4' long and 

 f wide, with a conspicuous yellow midrib; falling abruptly in early spring leaving the 

 branches bare during only a few weeks; petioles stout, yellow, rarely more than \' in 

 length. Flowers: staminate in red-stemmed hairy aments 2'-3' long; calyx pubescent 

 on the outer surface, divided into 4 ovate rounded lobes; pistillate on stout glabrous 

 peduncles, their involucral scales brown and hairy, about as long as the acute calyx- 

 lobes; stigmas dark red. Fruit sessile or subsessile, generally solitary; nut ovoid to hemi- 

 spheric, broad and slightly rounded at base, full and rounded at the puberulous apex, 

 dark brown, about \' long, inclosed for about one fourth its length in a thin saucer-shaped 

 cup red-brown and silky-pubescent on the inner surface, and covered by thin ovate light 

 red-brown scales rounded at apex and pale-pubescent except on their darker colored 

 margins. 



A tree, occasionally 100 high, with a tall trunk 3-4 in diameter, and comparatively 

 slender branches spreading gradually into a broad dense round-topped shapely head, and 

 slender glabrous branchlets dark red when they first appear, dark red-brown during their 

 first winter, becoming reddish brown or dark gray in their second season. Winter-buds 

 broadly ovoid or oval, abruptly narrowed and acute at apex, T y-i' long, with numerous 



