Its wood is used for the same purposes as that of the shagbark and is equally valuable. Its nut is large and sweet, and if the tree were put under cultivation, it would probably equal that of the shagbark in commercial value. As it is now, however, the shell is too thick, hard, and difficult to crack, and the kernel too small in proportion to the shell to make it marketable. The experiment of cultivating the mockernut to improve its fruit would be an interesting one, and certainly both the nuts of the mockernut and shagbark deserve as much attention as the English walnut.
Both the specific names,—the Latin alba, and the English white-heart—refer to the color of the wood. This tree is found in New England and also in the West and South.
Bitternut Hickory Hicoria minima
A large tree, with a light, granite-gray bark. Slender twigs, the recent shoots orange-green and dotted. Alternate leaf-scars. Buds long, curved, flattened, and pointed, the lateral ones shorter and more round than the terminal buds; all are orange-yellow in color,—the distinguishing characteristic of the tree. The nuts are bitter.
If the characteristic of the bitternut’s flattened, orange buds is remembered, this tree can be distinguished not only in winter, but at every other season of the year. The hickories are constantly confused, and the fact that they often hybridize complicates matters still more. Such an unfailing means of identification as these yellow buds is, therefore, a great help, and as there are always one or two lateral buds lying dormant along the stem, after the buds have opened in the spring, and as new buds are formed by the middle of the summer, there is scarcely a lapse of time when they fail to distinguish the tree. The bitternut is the most graceful of all the hickories. It has a smooth, tapering trunk and delicate twigs.
Its wood is heavy, hard, tough, and close-grained, and is used for the yokes of oxen, for hoops and fuel. The nuts are so bitter that squirrels refuse them as food.
The specific name, minima (the smallest), refers to the branches and foliage of the tree, which are more delicate than those of other hickories. The range is the same as that of the shagbark and mockernut.
Pignut Hickory Hicoria glabra
A large tree, 70 to 80 feet high, with a tapering trunk and smooth gray bark, which does not shag. The buds are yellowish brown, and smaller than those of other hickories, with no black outer scales like those of the shagbark, and smaller than the mockernut buds. The buds are either round, or egg-shaped. Delicate twigs; alternate leaf-scars. The nut has a thick shell and poor kernel; the husk does not split all the way down as it does with the shagbark.
