FAGACEvE 



257 



A tree, occasionally 80-90 high, with a short trunk 3-4 or rarely 6-7 in 

 diameter, dividing a few feet above the base into numerous great limbs often resting 

 on the ground and forming a low round-topped head frequently 150 across, and 

 slender dark gray or brown brauchlets tinged with red, coated at first with hoary 

 tomentum persistent until the second or third year; or sometimes the trunk, rising 

 to the height of 30 or 40, is crowned by a narrow head of small branches; often 

 much smaller; frequently shrubby in habit, with slender steins only a few feet high. 

 "Winter-buds globose and usually about J^' long, or ovate-oblong, acute, and some- 

 times on vigorous shoots nearly \' in length, with thin broadly ovate closely imbri- 

 cated light chestnut-brown glabrous or pubescent scales. Bark of young stems and 

 branches thin, close, light brown or pale bluish gray, becoming on old trunks 2' 3' 

 thick, dark brown slightly tinged with red, and divided into broad rounded ridges 

 separating on the surface into small closely appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, 

 close-grained, very brittle, light brown or reddish brown, with thick darker colored 

 sapwood; valued and largely used for fuel. 



Distribution. Usually in open groves of great extent from Mendocino County, 

 California, southward through the coast ranges and islands to Mt. San Pedro Martir, 

 Lower California; less common at the north; very abundant and of its largest size 

 in the valleys south of San Francisco Bay; frequently covering with semiprostrate 

 and contorted stems the sand dunes on the coast in the central part of the state ; in 

 southwestern California the largest and most generally distributed Oak-tree between 

 the mountains and the sea, often covering low hills and ascending to elevations of 

 2800 in the canons of the San Gorgonio Pass. 



Occasionally cultivated as an ornamental tree in temperate western and southern 

 Europe. 



** Stamens usually 6-8 j stigmas dilated ; abortive ovules basal or lateral ; leaves 

 persistent. 



23. Quercus chrysolepis, Liebm. Live Oak. Maul Oak. 



Leaves oblong-ovate to elliptical, acute or cuspidate at the apex, cordate, rounded 

 or wedge-shaped at the base, mostly entire on old trees or often dentate or sinuate- 



dentate on young trees, with 1 or 2 or many spinescent teeth, the two forms often 

 appearing together on vigorous shoots, clothed when they unfold with a thick tomen- 



