THE BEECH FAMILY. FAGACE^ 



THIS family includes the oaks, beeches and chestnuts, which 

 are among the best known and most useful hardwood trees. 

 They are widely distributed, being found all over the earth, and 

 rank next to the pines in economic value. 



The members of this family have simple, deciduous, pin- 

 nately veined leaves, sometimes variously lobed; but their 

 most distinctive feature is the fruit. It consists of a nut with 

 a tough or hard shell surrounded by, or embedded in, a fleshy 

 spiny outer covering. This outer coat is made up of the 

 thickened bracts of an involucre which surrounds the fertile 

 flower. The acorns, beech-nuts and chestnuts are so well 

 known, that they need only to be mentioned to bring up as- 

 sociations with the noble group of trees which bear them. 



Like most hardwood trees, the oaks, beeches and chestnuts 

 thrive best in a moist and temperate climate. One species of 

 oak is the only member which has proved itself able to stand 

 the drought and cold of the prairies. There seems little reason 

 to doubt that, given time, these trees would have reached the 

 coast region of British Columbia. That province is still in the 

 conifer stage of its forest development. The march of the 

 hardwood forest has not reached it, and now that man has 

 interfered, it never will reach it in the natural way. A single 

 species of oak is found on Vancouver Island 



I. THE OAKS 

 Genus Quercus 



"The Monarch oak, the patriarch of trees, 

 Shoots rising up, and spreads by slow degrees : 

 Three centuries he grows, and three he stays 

 Supreme in state; and in three more decays." DRYDEN. 

 i73 



