i8 Muhlenbergia, Volume 7 



pears to be evergreen, but remains on the trees onlj' until the 

 succeeding spring, usually beginning to fall before or a short 

 time after the new leaves are formed. Flowers appear mainly 

 in early spring, the acorns maturing in the autumn of that sea- 

 son; occasional trees produce flowers in the fall and small imma- 

 ture acorns which drop from the trees by spring. The cups of 

 acorns are peculiar in having their scaly edges turned in. Wood 

 brittle, hard, heavy, exceedingly fine-grained, reddish brown; 

 sapwood very thick and darker than heart. It has economic 

 value only for fuel, since the tree has a very poor timber form 

 and the wood checks and warps badly in seasoning. Bark of 

 this species is extensively used to adulterate the similar but 

 much more valuable tanbark obtained from the California tan- 

 bark oak." 



It ranges from Mendocino county south to northern Lower 

 California in the coast region, occurring on "low hills and open 

 valleys^ slopes of higher foothills, shallow canyons, in dry loamy 

 or gravelly soils; also (but stunted) on exposed seashore." While 

 not positive, I think it is found on the summit of Mt Hamilton, 

 Santa Clara county, at an altitude of 4200 feet. Sudworth re- 

 cords it from such an altitude only in the extreme southern part 

 of its range. It is also found on all of the islands off the coast 

 of southern California. Roughly, it occurs mainly within the 

 fog belt, but Sudworth says the climatic conditions are similar 

 to those for Monterey pine. This is not altogether correct. 

 The Monterey pine is subject to almost daily fogs in summer, 

 which is not the case in much of the range of this oak. The 

 average annual precipitation for the pine is given as seventeen 

 inches. In Mendocino county it is probably forty inches, but 

 the oak is not common there. At LosGatos, Santa Clara county, 

 where it is common, the average rainfall is thirty-one inches, 

 and a few miles farther back in the mountains is not less than 

 forty inches. 



One might infer from the sentence describing the falling of 

 the old leaves that they drop rapidly as do those of the ordinary 

 deciduous trees. This is not the case, for at no time does the 



