OAK FAMILY 
single specimen or mingled with other trees but always in 
tracts which it covers almest exclusively. Evidently it can 
flourish where other species cannot. 
BLACK JACK. BARREN OAK 
Quércus marilandica, Quércus nigra. 
A small shrubby tree, with small trunk, spreading and contorted 
branches. Grows on sandy barrens, and ranges from southern New 
York westward to Kansas and Nebraska and southward to the Flor- 
ida coast. Rare in the north, but abundant in the south where it 
is often found on heavy clays. Hybridizes freely. 
Bark.—Dark brown almost black, divided into rectangular plates 
which are covered with small scales. Branchlets stout, at first light 
red and scurfy, later reddish brown, finally dark brown. 
Wood.—Dark brown, sapwood lighter; heavy, hard, strong, used 
for fuel and in manufacture of charcoal. Sp. gr., 0.7324; weight of 
cu. ft., 45.64 tbs. 
Winter Buds.—Light reddish brown, angled, acute, hairy, one- 
fourth of an inch long. 
Leaves.—Alternate, five to seven inches long, broadly obovate, 
rounded or cordate at the narrow base, usually three-lobed at the 
broad apex. Form of lobes extremely variable, sometimes 
rounded sometimes acute, each lobe bristle-tipped. They come 
out of the bud pale pink, coated with tomentum, when half grown 
they are still coated with the pale hairs. When full grown they 
are thick and leathery, dark yellow green, shining above, and 
yellow, orange or brown and scurfy below ; midrib broad, dark yel- 
low, raised and rounded above, primary veins stout. In autumn 
they turn brown or yellow. Petioles stout, yellow, grooved above, 
one-half to three-fourths of an inch long. Stipules three-fourths of 
an inch long, caducous. 
Flowers.—May, when leaves are half grown. Staminate flowers 
borne in hairy catkins two to four inches long. Calyx of staminate 
flowers thin, scarious, tinged with red, covered with pale hairs and 
divided into four to five rounded lobes. Stamens usually four ; 
anthers dark red, Pistillate flowers borne on short peduncles 
covered with thick rusty tomentum. Involucral scales are coated 
with tomentum and about as long as the calyx lobes; stigmas re- 
flexed, short, broad, dark red. 
Acorns.—ipen in autumn of second year, solitary or in pairs, 
short stalked ; nut three-fourths of an inch in length, oblong, full and 
rounded at both ends, a trifle broader below than above the mid- 
dle, light yellow brown, often striate. Shell thin, lined with coat 
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