LAUREL OAK
Quercus imbricaria, Michx.
Form.—Height 50-100 feet, diameter 1-3 feet; crown pyramidal or round-topped and open, with drooping lateral branches.
Leaves.—Alternate, simple, 4-6 inches long, oblong or lanceolate, margins entire or sometimes undulate, with acute apex, dark green and lustrous above, pale and hairy beneath.
Flowers.—May, with the leaves; monoecious; staminate flowers borne on long catkins; the pistillate on short stalks.
Fruit.—Acorns mature the second autumn after the flowers; cup saucer-shaped, brown and glossy inside, with reddish-brown scales, and enclosing about ½ of the ovoid, dark brown, often striate nut.
Bark.—With shallow fissures and with ridges having brown scales.
Wood.—Heavy, hard, coarse-grained, reddish-brown.