

FAG AGILE 279 



with thick pale rufous tomentmn, at maturity thick, dark blue-green, and glabrous 

 or covered with scattered stellate hairs above, pale, usually yellow-green and clothed 

 with light brown pubescence, or puberulous or often glabrous below, l'-3' long, '-2' 

 broad, deciduous in the spring with the appearance of the new leaves; their petioles 

 slender, tomentose, becoming pubescent, \'-\' long. Flowers : staininate in slender 

 hairy aments 2'-3' long; calyx light yellow, pilose, with lanceolate acute segments; 

 pistillate on slender peduncles, clothed like their involucral scales with dense pale 

 tomentum. Fruit sessile or on slender pubescent stalks sometimes |' long; acorn 

 oblong, oval, and gradually narrowed and acute or broad and rounded at the obtuse 

 apex, broad or narrow at the base, dark chestnut-brown more or less conspicuously 

 marked by darker longitudinal stripes, turning light chestnut-brown in drying, '-!' 

 long, about % broad, inclosed for about one half its length in a deep saucer-shaped 

 cup-shaped or turbinate cup light brown and puberulous within, and covered by ovate 

 light brown scales coated with pale tomentum, usually thickened, united and tuber- 

 culate at the base of the cup, and near its rim produced into small acute ciliate tips. 



A tree, 50 -60 high, with a trunk 2-3 in diameter, thick branches spreading 

 nearly at right angles and forming a broad rather irregular head, and stout rigid 

 branchlets coated at first with hoary tomentum, light or dark brown tinged with 

 red and pubescent during their first winter, becoming glabrous and light brown or 

 gray in their second or third years. 'Winter-buds oval or ovate, about \' long, 

 with thin light red pubescent scales. Bark l^'-2' thick, light gray tinged with 

 brown and deeply divided into narrow fissures separating on the surface into small 

 thin appressed scales. Wood very heavy, hard, strong, close-grained, brittle, dark 

 brown or nearly black, with thick lighter brown sapwood; used only as fuel. 



Distribution. Low hills of southwestern California west of the coast range, oc- 

 cupying with Quercus agrifolia, Ne'e, a belt about fifty miles wide, and extending to 

 within fifteen or twenty miles of the coast, from the neighborhood of Sierra Madre 

 to the mesa east of San Diego. 



41. Quercus oblongifolia, Torr. "White Oak. 



Leaves ovate, oval, or slightly obovate, rounded and occasionally emarginate or 

 acute at the apex, usually cordate or occasionally rounded at the base, entire and 

 sometimes undulate, with thickened revolute margins, or remotely dentate, with 

 small callous teeth, on vigorous shoots and young plants oblong, rounded or cuneate 

 at the narrow base, coarsely sinuate or undulate-toothed or 3-toothed at the broad 

 apex and entire below, when they unfold bright red and coated with deciduous 

 hoary tomentum, at maturity thin and firm, bluo-green and lustrous above, paler 

 below, l'-2' long, ^' J' broad, or on vigorous shoots sometimes 3'-4' long, with pro- 

 minent pale midribs, slender primary veins, and conspicuous reticulate veinlets, per- 

 sistent during the winter without change of color, gradually turning yellow in the 

 spring and falling at the appearance of the new leaves; their petioles stout, nearly 

 terete, about \' long. Flowers: staminate in short hoary-tomentose aments; calyx 

 bright yellow, pilose, divided into 5 or 6 laciniately cut or entire acute segments 

 tinged with red above the middle; pistillate usually sessile, or on peduncles tomen- 

 tose like the involucral scales; stigmas bright red. Fruit usually solitary and ses- 

 sile, rarely long-stalked; acorn ovate, oval, or slightly obovate, full and rounded at the 

 apex, surrounded by a narrow ring of white pubescence, dark chestnut-brown, striate, 

 and very lustrous, soon becoming light brown in drying, ' f' long, about \' broad, 

 inclosed for about one third its length in a shallow cup-shaped or rarely turbinate 



