May i6, 1888.] 



Garden and Forest. 



137 



young- state at any rate, the growth of Q. confcrla is more 

 rapid than that of our indigenous species. 



For several years a specimen of the curious shrubby 

 oak {Q. reticulata) from Southern Arizona and Mexico, with- 

 stood, in a somewhat sheltered spot it is true, the rigors 

 - of our English climate, but having braved the hard winter 

 of 1879-80, it gave up the struggle to exist during the equal- 

 ly trying one of 1880-81. None of the characteristic Him- 

 alayan Oaks are hardy at Kew and some of the Japanese 

 ones do not succeed. Several, however, from the latter 

 country, do well and are perfectly hardy. Q. acuta — a 

 handsome, very variable species with thick evergreen 

 leaves — perhaps better known under the name of Q. Buer- 

 geri, comes under the latter category. On the other hand. 



almost entirely shed as the young ones are bursting their 

 buds — forms of the Turkey 6ak((). Cerris), do wonderfully 

 well at Kew. The Lucombe and Fulham Oaks are two of 

 the best of these ; practically they may l)e regarded as 

 identical, for the differences between them are very slight. 

 In his '■ Arboje.um et Frulicetum Britannicum " Loudon says : 

 "The age and origin of the Fulham Oak are unknown; 

 but Mr. Smithers, an old man who has been employed in 

 the Fulham nursery from his youth, and who remembers 

 the tree above forty-five j'ears, says that it always went by 

 the name of the Fulham Oak, and that he understood it to 

 have been raised there from seed. We have examined the 

 tree at its collar, and down to its main roots, several feet 

 under ground ; and, from the uniform texture, and thick 



A Well-arranged Flower Border. 



Q. de?ttata oi Thunherg (Q. Daimyo of gardens) is apt to 

 suffer severely during an exceptionally hard winter ; this 

 species is, however, well worth a place in any collection of 

 ornamental trees on account of its noble leaves — one I 

 measured some four years ago, in the Isleworth Arboretum 

 of Messrs. Charles Lee & Son being no less than eighteen 

 inches in length, with a width, at the broadest part, of ten 

 inches. Q. dentata is also especially interesting by reason 

 of its being one of the food plants of a Chinese silkworm, a 

 long account of which is contained in the ' ' Commercial Re- 

 ports from Her Majesty's Consuls in China and Japan, 1865." 

 The evergreen, or rathersub-e vergreen — for the old leaves, 

 although remaining on the tree throughout the winter, are 



corky character of the bark, we feel satisfied that it is not 

 a grafted tree." A few years ago, however, before Messrs. 

 Osborne's nursery was broken up, I saw this same tree, 

 and shoots of Quercus pedunculata were springing from 

 the trunk, proving that the specimen was a grafted one 

 and that in spite of his careful examination Loudon was 

 deceived. Another Oak, figured and described by Dr. 

 Masters in the Gardeners' Chronicle, series ii., vol. xiv. p. 

 715, under the name of Q. glandulifera of Blume, is, I have 

 little doubt, a curious hybrid of which the Turkey Oak is 

 one of the parents. At any rate, it is not the tyjiical 

 Japanese plant described originally under the name of Q. 

 glandulifera by Blume. George Xicholsoii. 



