A tree, 25°—30° high, with a trunk sometimes a foot in diameter and 6° or 7° long, covered with close light gray bark tinged with red and divided by shallow fissures into small plates, stout ascending branches forming an open irregular often round-topped head, and slender nearly straight branchlets densely villose when they first appear, dark orange color tinged with red and sparingly villose when the flowers open, becoming bright red-brown and lustrous at the end of their first season and dark dull reddish brown the following year, and sparingly armed with slender nearly straight red-brown shining spines 1½′—2′ long.
Distribution. Open woods near the borders of streams in moist rich soil; northeastern Illinois (Thatcher’s Park, Glendon Park, and River Forest, Cook County); not common.
96. [Cratægus assurgens] Sarg.
Leaves broad-ovate, acuminate, rounded or rarely cuneate at the wide entire base, sharply doubly serrate above with straight gland-tipped teeth, and slightly divided, into 3 or 4 pairs of small acuminate lobes, about one third grown when the flowers open the middle of May and then roughened above by short white hairs and glabrous or sparingly villose below, with persistent hairs on the slender yellow midrib, and on the veins arching obliquely to the point of the lobes, and at maturity membranaceous, dull dark green and scabrate on the upper surface, light yellow-green on the lower surface, 2¾′—3½′ long, and 2¼′—2¾′ wide; petioles slender, villose early in the season, becoming pubescent, 1′—1½′ in length; leaves at the end of vigorous shoots often deeply lobed, coarsely serrate, sometimes 4′ long and wide, with long stout glandular petioles and foliaceous lunate acuminate coarsely glandular-serrate persistent stipules. Flowers ¾′—⅝′ in diameter, on short villose pedicels, in compact 8—15-flowered hairy corymbs, with oblong, acuminate, glandular bracts and bractlets, deciduous with the opening of the flowers; calyx-tube narrowly obconic, sparingly villose, the lobes long, narrow, acuminate, tipped with minute red glands, finely glandular-serrate, glabrous on the outer, pubescent on the inner surface; stamens 10—20, usually 10; anthers pinkish purple; styles 4 or 5, surrounded at base by tufts of pale hairs. Fruit ripening from the 15th to the 20th of September, and usually falling about the 1st of October, on short glabrous pedicels, in drooping few-fruited clusters, short-oblong to slightly obovoid, dull red to crimson, ½′—⅝′ long, about ½′ wide; calyx sessile, with spreading closely appressed serrate usually persistent lobes; flesh thin, pale yellow or nearly white, acidulous; nutlets 4 or 5, broad, narrow and acute at the ends, prominently ridged on the back with a high narrow ridge, or often grooved, about ¼′ long.
A tree, sometimes 25° high, with a trunk 2′—6′ in diameter and often 6°—9° long, covered with close dark gray bark, ascending branches forming an oblong, open head, and slender branchlets light orange-yellow and covered when they first appear with long scattered caducous white hairs, becoming bright red-brown and lustrous, and dark gray-brown the following year, and armed with many stout usually slightly curved bright red-brown shining spines, 1′—1½′ long.
Distribution. River banks and low woods in rich soil; northeastern Illinois (Leyden township, La Grange, Thatcher’s Park, Cook County, Highland Park, Deerfield, Wauconda, Lake County); Fox Point, Milwaukee County, Wisconsin.
97. [Cratægus Pringlei] Sarg.
Leaves oval, acute, rounded or often abruptly narrowed and cuneate at base, occasionally irregularly lobed above the middle with short broad acute lobes, and coarsely and often doubly serrate with glandular teeth, as they unfold villose on both surfaces, and often more or less tinged with red, when the flowers open, usually in the last week of May, roughened above by short closely appressed pale hairs and glabrous below with the exception of a few hairs on the slender midrib and remote primary veins, and at maturity thin, glabrous, and bright yellow-green on the upper surface, pale below, 2′—2½′ long, and 1¾′—2¼′ wide, usually conspicuously concave by the gradual turning down of the blades from the midrib to the margins, drooping on long thin slender glandular petioles at first villose, ultimately glabrous, 1′—1¾′ in length; leaves at the end of vigorous shoots sometimes truncate or slightly cordate at the base, and frequently 3′ long and wide. Flowers about ¾′ in diameter, on stout hairy pedicels, in many-flowered compound villose corymbs; calyx-tube narrowly obconic, villose, particularly toward the base, the lobes narrow, acuminate, coarsely glandular-serrate, villose on both surfaces or only on the inner surface; stamens 10, occasionally 5—10; anthers small, purple; styles 3—5, surrounded at the base by conspicuous tufts of pale tomentum. Fruit ripening and falling late in September or early in October, on stout pedicels, in erect villose mostly few-fruited clusters, short-oblong, dark dull red, marked by few dark dots, villose at the ends with long scattered pale hairs, ¾′ long and ⅝′ in diameter; calyx little enlarged, the lobes gradually narrowed from a broad base, acuminate, glandular-serrate, often erect; flesh thick, yellow, dry and acid, with a disagreeable flavor; nutlets 3—5, rounded and slightly ridged on the back, ⅓′ long.