472 



TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



Distribution. Low rich woods on the bottom-lands of the Brazos River at Columbia 

 and Brazoria, Brazoria County, Texas. 



76. Cratsegus meridionalis Sarg. 



Leaves elliptic to ovate or slightly obovate, acuminate, cuneate at the entire base, and 

 coarsely often doubly serrate above with broad straight glandular teeth, poated below with 

 hoary tomentum and covered above with short white hairs when they unfold, more than 

 half grown when the flowers open from the first to the middle of April, and at maturity 

 thin, yellow-green and scabrate on the upper surface, paler and villose-pubescent on the 

 lower surface, especially on the slender midrib and primary veins, 2'-3f ' long, and l'-2' 

 wide; petioles slender, slightly wing-margined at apex, densely villose-pubescent with white 

 hairs early in the season, becoming glabrous or nearly glabrous, \'~\' in length; leaves at 

 the end of vigorous shoots broad-ovate to broad-elliptic, more coarsely serrate, occasionally 



Fig. 428 



slightly divided into short broad lateral lobes, often 4' long and 2^' wide, with a stout mid- 

 rib and petioles broadly wing-margined at apex, and about \' in length. Flowers f ' in 

 diameter, on stout pedicels thickly covered like the narrow obconic calyx-tube with matted 

 silvery white hairs, in broad compact many-flowered villose corymbs, with conspicuous 

 glandular-serrate villose bracts and bractlets mostly persistent until after the flowers open; 

 calyx-lobes narrow, acuminate, laciniately glandular-serrate, slightly villose-pubescent 

 when the buds open; stamens 20; anthers white; styles 3-5, surrounded at base by a broad 

 ring of white tomentum. Fruit ripening from the middle to the end of September, on 

 elongated slender puberulous pedicels, in few-fruited drooping red-stemmed clusters, short- 

 oblong to subglobose, rounded at the ends, scarlet, \' to f ' in diameter, the calyx per- 

 sistent, much enlarged, with erect or spreading conspicuous lobes; nutlets 3-5, rounded at 

 base, acute at apex, ridged on the back with a high rounded ridge, about \' long. 



A tree, often 25 high, with a trunk 8' in diameter, covered w T ith dark bark slightly divided 

 by shallow fissures into broad thin plates, spreading ashy gray branches forming a round- 

 topped head, and slender zigzag branchlets, covered when they first appear with long white 

 hairs, soon glabrous, orange-brown or reddish brown during their first season and dull gray 

 the following year, and armed with numerous straight slender purple spines l'-2' in length. 



Distribution. Limestone soil, in upland woods and glades; common in the limestone belt 

 of central Alabama, from the neighborhood of Gallion, Hale County to western Missis- 

 sippi (Starkville, Oktibbeha County, and Brookville, Noxubee County). 



77. Crataegus Treleasei Sarg. 



Leaves ovate to elliptic, acute, concave-cuneate or rounded at the narrow base, sharply 

 doubly serrate above with straight glandular teeth, and slightly divided into 3 or 4 pairs of 



