HICKORY NUTS. 159 



bottom lands along the Ohio, Mississippi and lower Mis- 

 souri. Elliott, in "Botany of South Carolina and 

 Georgia" (1824), says it is rare in the low country 

 of Carolina, but he does not say that it is found plen- 

 tiful anywhere in the South. That he was sometimes in 

 doubt in regard to the identification of this and other 

 species.may be inferred from his remark, namely : " The 

 greater part of our hickories resemble each other so 

 closely in their leaves and vary so much in their fruit 

 that it is very difficult to discriminate the species." 



It is this difficulty of identification which has led to 

 so much confusion in the application of the specific 

 names, for the earlier botanists rarely had an opportu- 

 nity of a close and careful examination of the* trees or 

 ■ other plants which they attempted to describe. In rela- 

 tion to the species under consideration, we find that the 

 specific name of sulcata, so long in use, was adopted by 

 Nuttall, from some earlier or contemporaneous author, 

 — a system he followed with all the different species of 

 the hickory, but without, in some instances, any dis- 

 crimination or regard to their adaptation or validity. 

 If there was anything to show that Willdenow (1796) 

 had this Western shellbark in mind, or that he or his 

 correspondents, in this country had ever seen or collected 

 it, then we might adopt the name of sulcata as the orig- 

 inal and true one ; but in the absence of such informa- 

 tion, with a full and accurate description of the species 

 and its habitats by Michaux, under the name of laciniosa, 

 I think, in common justice to one of the most eminent 

 dendrologists who ever visited this country, the name 

 given should stand as the true one for this species. See 

 Michaux, "North American Sylva," Vol. I, p. 128. 



Synonyms : 



Juglans sulcata {?), Willdenow, 1796. 



Juglans laciniosa, Michaux, 1810. 



Carya sulcata, Nuttall, 1818. 



Carya cordiformis, Koch, Dendrologie. 



