A Hybrid Oak at Westerieigh, Staten Island 



\Vm. T. Davis 



While making observations on the seventeen-year Cicada 

 on June 12, 1928, the writer was pleased to come upon an 

 interesting hybrid oak on the northerly side of Chandler 

 Ave. about one hundred feet from Jewett Ave. at \\'ester- 

 leigh, Staten Island. In laying out the first named avenue 

 several years ago, the tree, which is close to what will be a 

 side walk, was cut off about one foot above the ground leaving 

 a low stump one foot four inches in circumference from which 

 about a dozen shoots have since grown up, some of them to 

 a height of about seven feet. One of the shoots is five and 

 three quarters inches in circumference and seven feet two 

 inches high. The foliage of this tree is remarkable and is that 

 of the celebrated Quercus heterophylla Michx., which is supposed 

 to be, and probably is, a hybrid between the red oak Quercus 

 rubra, and the willow oak Quercus phellos. There are however, 

 no known willow oaks anywhere near Westerieigh, nor are 

 they to be expected in that part of the Island. The hybrid 

 is evidently a native of the semi-wooded area where it stands 

 today. Its trunk is within seven inches of that of a larger 

 red oak with normal leaves and acorns; some of the latter, 

 produced in 1927, I found on the ground. The leaves on the 

 hybrid are thin and like those of a red oak, only much narrower, 

 while many others are small and in shape like those of the 

 willow oak. 



This interesting tree will probably soon be completely 

 destroyed by the widening of Chandler Ave., or the building 

 of a house on the lot where it grows. How it got in its present 

 position, so far removed from the willow oaks at the other 

 end of the Island thirteen miles away, is a mystery. The 

 nearest Quercus heterophylla is an introduced specimen growing 

 in the Clove Valley on the westerly side of Britton's Upper 

 pond, about one and a half miles away, on land now included 

 in the city park area. This tree came from an acorn planted 

 by the writer in October, 1888, and has now attained a con- 

 siderable size, being four feet eight inches in circumference 

 three feet from the ground. An account of it by Dr. Arthur 



