Small Fruited Hickory 



235 



The branches are short and stout, forming a narrow cylindric tree. The gray 

 bark is 6 to 20 mm. thick, separating into persistent strap-like plates often 3 dm. 

 long. The twigs are very slender, smooth, glaucous, and purplish brown. The 

 terminal buds are ovoid-lanceolate, 6 mm. long, tapering into a blunt point, their 

 scales imbricated, hght brown and shining; the inner scales grow to a length of 

 5 cm., are taper-pointed, and yellow; the 

 lateral buds are oblong, blunt, and very 

 small. The leaves are i to 2 dm. long; 

 the leaf-stalk is slender, rounded, and 

 nearly smooth, the leaflets 3 or 5, lanceo- 

 late, sometimes very narrow, 6 to 15 cm. 

 long, somewhat curved, gradually nar- 

 rowed or rounded at the unequal, sessile 

 base; they are long taper- pointed, coarsely 

 toothed and hairy-fringed on the margin, 

 thin and firm, dark green above, yel- 

 lowish green and shining beneath. The 

 upper leaflets are sometimes twice as long 

 as the lower; the terminal leaflet is short- 

 stalked; the leaves become characteris- 

 tically dull yellow or dull brown in early 

 autumn. The staminate catkins are in 

 short-stalked clusters of 3, loosely flow- 

 ered; bract nearly smooth, much longer 

 than the lobes of the perianth; stamens 4. 

 together, oblong, yellowish hairy. The fruit is subglobose, 1.5 to 3 cm. in di- 

 ameter, reddish brown; the husk is relatively thick, splitting completely into 4 

 valves; nut flattened, 4-angled, ovoid, pointed at the end and nearly white, or 

 brownish; shell thin; seed large and sweet. 



The wood is hard, tough and strong, close-grained and Ught reddish brown. 



This tree has long been confused with the Shellbark hickory from which it 

 differs in its thin twigs, smaller buds, and narrower leaflets. 



Fig. 192. — Southern Shellbark. 

 The pistillate flowers are mostly 2 



II. SMALL FRUITED HICKORY — Hicoria microcarpa (NuttaU) Britton 



Juglans squamosa microcarpa Barton. Carya microcarpa Nuttall 

 Hicoria glabra odorata Sargent 



'This Hickory occurs in rich woods from Massachusetts to Michigan, southward 

 to Missouri and Georgia. It is also known as Small pignut hickory. Little pignut 

 hickory. Little shagbark, and Balsam hickory. 



The trunk and branches are similar to those of the Pignut hickory. The bark 

 is close and furrowed on young trees, but on old trunks it is shaggj', in thin plates. 

 The twigs are rather slender, long hairj- at first, becoming quite smooth, except 



