OAKS AT ALDENHAM. 



173 



7,000 ft. It is named after Dr. William Gambel, a naturalist who 

 explored Upper California. It was first received at Kew in 1909, and 

 the Aldenham specimen, which is now over 9 ft. high, was given me 

 about the same date by Professor Sargent, and as far as I know there 

 are no older or materially larger plants at present existing in Europe. 



The following account is abbreviated from Sargent's " Manual 

 of the Trees of North America." A tree with a narrow, round-topped 

 head, usually about 25 ft. high, and rarely reaching 40 to 50 ft., 

 leaves 3 to 5 in. long by 1 to 5 in. wide, broadly obovate to 

 oblong lanceolate, rounded at the narrow apex, wedge-shaped, or some- 

 times narrowed and rounded, or broad, and heart-shaped at the base, 

 lustrous and dark yellow- green above, and carrying a thick white 

 felt on the under-side ; the midrib being pale and prominent. Acorns 

 oval, usually about f in. long by f in. wide, more or less deeply enclosed 

 in the saucer-shaped, cup-shaped, or rarely turbinate, cup. These 

 sessile acorns mature in one season. This species is the nearest of 

 the Western oaks to the Eastern white oak, Q. alba, but the dead leaves 

 do not cling to the branches in winter as do those of Q. alba. It is 

 also very closely allied to the equally rare or rarer Q. utahensis ; indeed, 

 Professor Sargent appears at one time to have regarded the two 

 as synonymous ; see, however, later in this article, sub Q. utahensis, 

 the remarks of Rydberg, who distinguishes between them, calling 

 utahensis a small tree with leaves bearing a velvety surface on the 

 under-side, and somewhat modifies Sargent's account of Q. Gambelii 

 by describing it as a bush in which this characteristic of leaves with a 

 velvety under-surface is absent. Truth to say, very little is yet known 

 about either of these two oaks on this side of the globe. 



Q. Garryana (Hooker) is, like the last, one of the North American 

 White oaks, which section as a rule thrives much worse in Europe 

 than the Red ; but, coming as it does from the West, it is likely to fare 

 better than the Eastern ones. Its distribution ranges along the 

 Pacific coast from Vancouver Island in the north to California in 

 the south, and it is stated to be most abundant and attain the greatest 

 size in Western Washington and Oregon. From 6b to 70 ft. seems 

 to be its usual height, while sometimes reaching about 100 ft. The 

 bark is of a light-grey colour ; leaves obovate to oblong, pointed at 

 the apex, wedge-shaped or rounded at base, coarsely lobed, dark green 

 above, and light-green or orange-brown below, with a stout yellow midrib 

 and conspicuous primary veins, in length 4 to 6 in. by 2 to 5 in. 

 broad ; acorns 1 to in. long by J to 1 in. broad. (See 

 Sargent's " Manual of the Trees of North America," p. 262, from which 

 the above account is drawn, also " West American Oaks " by E. L. 

 Greene (1886), where it is stated that the sessile acorns are set in small 

 shallow cups and mature in one year.) The general effect of the tree 

 is not unlike that produced by our own common pedunculate oak. 



The exact date of its first introduction into Europe is not known 

 to me, but it was first received at Kew in 1895, though the plants of 

 that date have not survived. By 1904 there was a plant in the Botanic 



