306 TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



often not more than 20-30 tall, with a trunk 8'-12' in diameter. Winter-buds ovoid, 

 acute or acuminate, j' |' long, with bright chestnut-brown scales pilose toward the apex 

 and ciliate on the margins. Bark of young stems and small branches thin, smooth, purplish 

 brown, often lustrous, becoming on old trunks and large limbs f'-l^' thick, dark reddish 

 brown or nearly black, and divided into broad rounded ridges covered with small closely 

 appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, strong, rather tough, close-grained, durable in con- 

 tact with the soil, largely used for fencing, railway-ties, and fuel. The bark, which is rich 

 in tannin, is consumed in large quantities in tanning leather. 



Distribution. Hillsides and the high rocky banks of streams in rich and deep or some- 

 times in sterile soil; coast of southern Maine, southern New Hampshire and eastern Massa- 

 chusetts, southward to Delaware and the District of Columbia, and along the Appalachian 



Fig. 280 



Mountains and their foothills to northern Georgia ( Wilkes County) ; ascending to altitudes 

 of 4000-4500; in northern Alabama; westward to the shores of Lake Champlain, western 

 New York; southeastern and southern Ohio, and southern Indiana westward to Orange 

 County (C. C. Deam) ; and to central Kentucky and Tennessee, and northeastern Missis- 

 sippi (Alcorn, Prentiss and Tishomingo Counties) ; rare and local in New England and 

 Ontario; abundant on the banks of the lower Hudson River and on the Appalachian hills 

 from southern New York to Alabama; most common and of its largest size on the lower 

 slopes of the mountains of the Carolinas and Tennessee, here often forming a large part 

 of the forest. 



X Quercus Sargentii Rehd. believed to be a hybrid of Quercus montana and the Euro- 

 pean Q. Robur L., has been growing for nearly a hundred years at what is now Holm Lea, 

 Brookline, Norfolk County, Massachusetts. 



54. Quercus Muehlenbergii Engelm. Yellow Oak. Chestnut Oak. 



Quercus acuminata Sarg. 



Leaves usually crowded at the ends of the branches, oblong-lanceolate to broadly 

 obovate, acute or acuminate with a long narrow or with a short broad point, abruptly or 

 gradually narrowed and cuneate or slightly narrowed and rounded or cordate at base, 

 equally serrate with acute and often incurved or broad and rounded teeth tipped with 

 small glandular mucros, or rarely slightly undulate, when they unfold bright bronzy green 

 and puberulous above, tinged with purple and coated below with pale tomentum, at 



