Distribution. Low rich bottom-lands and intervales, or rarely in the northwest on low dry hills; Nova Scotia and New Brunswick southward to the valley of the Penobscot River, Maine, the shore of Lake Champlain, Vermont, western Massachusetts, central, southern and western Pennsylvania, northern Delaware, northern West Virginia (Hardy and Grant Counties), prairies of Caswell County, North Carolina, and middle Tennessee, and westward through the valley of the Saint Lawrence River and along the northern shores of Lake Huron to southern Manitoba, through western New York and Ohio, northern Michigan, to Minnesota (except in the northeastern counties), eastern and northwestern Nebraska, the Black Hills of South Dakota, the Turtle Mountains of North Dakota, and northeastern Wyoming, and to central Kansas, the valley of the north Fork of the Canadian River (Canton, Blaine County, and Seiling, Dewey County), Oklahoma, and the valley of the San Saba River, (Menard County and Callahan County), Texas; attaining its largest size in southern Indiana and Illinois; the common Oak of the “oak openings” of western Minnesota, and in all the basin of the Red River of the North, ranging farther to the northwest than the other Oaks of eastern America; common and generally distributed in eastern Nebraska, and of a large size in cañons or on river bottoms in the extreme northwestern part of the state; the most generally distributed Oak in southern Wisconsin, and in Kansas growing to a large size in all the eastern part of the state.
Occasionally planted as an ornamental tree in the eastern United States and in South Africa.
× Quercus Andrewsii Sarg., believed to be a hybrid of Quercus macrocarpa and Q. undulata Torr., in habit and characters intermediate between those of its supposed parents with which it grows, occurs at Seiling, Dewey County, western Oklahoma.
× Quercus guadalupensis Sarg., with characters intermediate between those of Quercus macrocarpa and Q. stellata and evidently a hybrid of these species, occurs at Fredericksburg Junction in the valley of the Guadalupe River, Kendall County, Texas.
× Quercus Hillii Trel., believed to be a hybrid of Quercus macrocarpa and Q. Muehlenbergii, has been found at Roby, Lake County, Indiana, and near Independence, Jackson County, Missouri.
43. [Quercus lyrata] Walt. Overcup Oak. Swamp White Oak.
Leaves oblong-obovate, gradually narrowed and cuneate at base, divided into spreading or ascending lobes by deep or shallow sinuses rounded, straight, or oblique on the bottom, the terminal lobe oblong-ovate, usually broad, acute or acuminate at the elongated apex, and furnished with 2 small entire nearly triangular lateral lobes, the upper lateral lobes broad, more or less emarginate, or acuminate and entire or slightly lobed and much longer than the acute or rounded lower lobes, when they unfold bronze-green and pilose above with caducous hairs, and coated below with thick pale tomentum, at maturity thin and firm, dark green and glabrous above, silvery white and thickly coated with pale pubescence, or green and often nearly glabrous below, 7′—10′ long, 1′—4′ wide; turning yellow or scarlet and orange in the autumn; petioles glabrous or pubescent, ⅓′—1′ in length. Flowers: staminate in slender hairy aments 4′—6′ long; calyx light yellow, coated on the outer surface with pale hairs and divided into acute segments; pistillate sessile or stalked, their involucral scales covered, like the peduncles, with thick pale tomentum. Fruit sessile or borne on slender pubescent peduncles sometimes 1½′ in length; nut subglobose to ovoid or rarely to ovoid-oblong, ½′—1′ long, usually broader at base than long, light chestnut-brown, more or less covered above the middle with short pale pubescence, entirely or for two thirds of its length inclosed in the ovoid, nearly spherical or deep cup-shaped thin cup, bright red-brown and pubescent on the inner surface, hoary-tomentose and covered on the outer by ovate united scales produced into acute tips, much thickened and contorted at its base, gradually growing thinner and forming a ragged edge to the thin often irregularly split rim of the cup.
A tree, rarely 100° high, with a trunk 2°—3° in diameter, generally divided 15°—20° above the ground into comparatively small often pendulous branches forming a handsome symmetrical round-topped head, and slender branchlets green more or less tinged with red and pilose or pubescent when they first appear, light or dark orange-color or grayish brown and usually glabrous during their first winter, ultimately becoming ashy gray or light brown. Winter-buds ovoid, obtuse, about ⅛′ long, with light chestnut-brown scales covered, especially near their margins, with loose pale tomentum. Bark ¾′—1′ thick, light gray tinged with red and broken into thick plates separating on the surface into thin irregular appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, strong, tough, very durable in contact with the ground, rich dark brown, with thick lighter colored sapwood; confounded commercially with the wood of Quercus alba, and used for the same purpose.
Distribution. River swamps and small deep depressions on rich bottom-lands, usually wet throughout the year; southern New Jersey (Riddleton, Salem County), and valley of the Patuxent River, Maryland, southward near the coast to western Florida, through the Gulf states to the valley of the Navasota River, Brazos County, Texas, and through Arkansas to the valley of the Meramec River (Allenton, St. Louis County), Missouri, and to central Tennessee and Kentucky, southern Illinois, and southwestern Indiana to Spencer County; comparatively rare in the Atlantic and east Gulf states; most common and of its largest size in the valley of the Red River, Louisiana, and the adjacent parts of Texas and Arkansas.