WALNUT FAMILY 



Bark. Light grayish brown tinged with red, broken into thin 

 plate-like scales. In old trees very rugged. Branchlets slender, 

 marked with pale lenticels, at first bright green, downy, later become 

 reddish brown, during the first winter reddish or orange brown, 

 shining, with small, elevated, obscurely three-lobed leaf-scars, in the 

 second year dark or light gray. 



Wood. Dark or light brown, sap wood much paler ; heavy, hard, 

 close-grained, tough and strong. Used for cooperage and for fuel. 

 Sp. gr. , 0.7552 ; weight of cu. ft., 47.06 Ibs. 



Winter Buds. Terminal buds one-third to three-fourths of an 

 inch long, compressed, narrow oval, oblique at apex. Lateral buds 

 much smaller. Inner scales enlarge when spring growth begins, the 

 innermost becoming an inch and a half long and half an inch broad, 

 strap-shaped, pinnate at the apex, one and a half inch long, one-half 

 inch broad, yellow green, downy. 



Leaves. Alternate, compound, six to ten inches long. Leaflets 

 seven to eleven, lanceolate, ovate-lanceolate, or oblong, often un- 

 equally wedge-shaped or partly cordate at base, sessile with the ex- 

 ception of the terminal leaflet, serrate, acute or acuminate. Leaflet 

 vernation involute. They come out of the bud bright yellow green 

 or bronze red, shining, hairy and tomentose ; when full grown are 

 thick, firm, dark yellow green above, paler beneath ; midribs prom- 

 inent. In autumn they turn clear or rusty yellow. Petioles slender, 

 hairy, slightly grooved. 



Flowers. May, June, when leaves are half grown ; monoecious. 

 Staminate flowers, green, borne in triple catkins, three or four 

 inches long. Common peduncle about an inch long ; stamens four; 

 anthers yellow ; bract longer than calyx lobes. Pistillate flowers 

 one-half inch long, slightly angled, covered with yellow tomentum. 

 Bract lanceolate, hairy ; bractlets broadly ovate, shorter than the 

 calyx lobes ; stigmas pale green, mature and wither before the 

 staminate flowers open. 



Fruit. Obovate or globular, three-fourths to one and one-half 

 inches long, with four wings or ridges from the apex to the middle 

 which mark the valves, apex shows the remnants of the stigmas, 

 surface more or less thickly covered with golden scurfy pubescence, 

 and marked on inner surface with dark veins. Nut ovate or oblong, 

 compressed, marked at base with dark lines, gray with reddish tinge. 

 Kernel very bitter. October. 



Distinguishing Characters. Winter buds bright yellow, bud scales 

 valvate. Leaflets seven to eleven, lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate. 

 Fruit four-winged from apex nearly to the middle ; nut often broader 

 than long, thin-shelled, slightly four-angled, kernel bitter. 



The Swamp Hickory or Bitternut has the smallest leaflets 

 of any of the hickories ; they are narrow, almost slender, and 

 suggest willow leaves in their contour. They are a distin- 



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