Georgia Hackberry 



357 



5. SMALL'S HACKBERRY-OeltisSmallii Beadle 



The known range of this recently described tree is from North Carolina and 

 Tennessee to Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Texas. It has been confused with 

 the Mississippi hackberry, but appears to differ from that species by its sharply 

 toothed leaves; the two are, however, closely related. It prefers wet soil and 

 inhabits river shores and swamps in Georgia, 

 attaining a height of 25 meters, with a trunk 

 diameter of about 6 dm. 



The young twigs are very slender, smooth, 

 green, becoming purplish brown. The leaves 

 vary from lanceolate to ovate-lanceolate; they 

 are thin, delicately but rather conspicuously 

 veined, long-pointed, slender-stalked, some- 

 what hairy when young but nearly or quite 

 smooth when fully grown, 5 to 10 cm. long, 

 their edges sharply toothed; the upper sur- 

 face is somewhat darker green than the lower; 

 the leaf-stalks are 8 to 18 mm. long; the 

 stipules fall away after the leaves begin to 

 unfold. The sepals of the staminate flowers 

 are narrowly oblong and blunt. The nearly 

 globular fruit is 5 to 7 mm. in diameter, its slender stalk equalling or longer than 

 the subtending petiole. 



Fig. 315. — Small's Hackberry. 



6. GEORGIA HACKBERRY - Celtis georgiana Small 



The Georgia hackberry in- 

 habits rocky or gravelly soil and 

 ranges from New Jefsey to 

 Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, and 

 Alabama. It is usually a mere 

 shrub, sometimes flowering when 

 2 meters high or less, but some- 

 times becomes a tree 6 to 10 me- 

 ters high. 



The young twigs are hairy, 

 greenish, slender, becoming 

 smooth and purple-brown. The 

 leaves are smaller than those of 

 ^he other species, not exceeding 

 5 or 6 cm. in length; they are 

 Fig. 316. — Georgia Hackberry. rather thick when mature, ovate. 



