Leaves 5′—8′ long, with a long slender terete petiole, and 5 or occasionally 7 usually long-stalked ovate broad-oval or obovate leaflets, rounded or acute, or often abruptly pointed at apex, cuneate, rounded or slightly cordate at base, and coarsely crenulate-serrate, chiefly above the middle, light green slightly tinged with red and pilose with occasional pale caducous hairs when they unfold, and at maturity thick and firm, glabrous, dark green on the upper surface, pale on the lower surface, 1′—3′ long and ¾′—2′ wide, and occasionally furnished below with tufts of long white hairs at the base of the broad midrib, and in the axils of the numerous conspicuous veins forked near the margins and connected by coarse reticulate veinlets; petiolules slender, ¼′—½′ and on the terminal leaflet up to 1′ in length. Flowers diœcious, appearing in March as the leaves begin to unfold, in compact glabrous panicles from the axils of leaves of the previous year, and covered in the bud by ovate rounded orange-colored scales; staminate flower composed of a minute or nearly obsolete 4-lobed calyx and 2 stamens, with short filaments and linear-oblong light purple apiculate anthers; calyx of the female flower deep cup-shaped, and divided to the base into 4 acute lobes; ovary gradually narrowed into a long slender style. Fruit in short compact clusters, spatulate to oblong, surrounded at base by the persistent calyx, ½′—1′ long and ⅛′—¼′ wide, the wing rounded or occasionally emarginate at apex, and terminal on the short terete many-rayed body; very rarely with 3 or 4 wings extending to the base of the fruit.
A tree, rarely 50° high, with a short trunk occasionally 2°—3° in diameter, thick spreading often contorted branches, and stout terete branchlets dark green tinged with red and slightly puberulous when they first appear, becoming light yellow-brown or light orange color during the summer, and in their first winter light brown marked by remote oblong pale lenticels and by large elevated lunate leaf-scars displaying a row of conspicuous fibro-vascular bundle-scars, and dark or reddish brown in their second or third season; usually much smaller. Winter-buds: terminal acute, with 3 pairs of scales, those of the first pair broad-ovate, rounded at the apex, dark orange color, pilose toward the base, and rather shorter than the ovate rounded scales of the second pair coated with rufous tomentum and becoming ½′ long or about one half the length of the linear strap-shaped scales of the inner pair truncate or emarginate at the apex and orange color. Bark of the trunk ½′—¾′ thick, dark gray and deeply divided by narrow fissures into broad scaly ridges. Wood heavy, hard, strong, light brown, with thin lighter colored sapwood; valued as fuel and occasionally used for flooring.
Distribution. Texas, high dry limestone bluffs and ridges, in the neighborhood of Dallas, Dallas County, and Fort Worth, Tarrant County, to the valley of the Colorado River near Austin, Travis County, and over the Edwards Plateau to Bandera, Kerr, Edwards and Palo Pinto Counties.
Hardy in the Arnold Arboretum.
10. [Fraxinus biltmoreana] Beadl.
Leaves 10′—12′ long, with a stout pubescent or puberulous petiole, and 7—9 oblong-ovate to ovate-lanceolate or oval often falcate entire or obscurely toothed leaflets acuminate at apex, rounded or cuneate and often inequilateral at base, yellow-bronze color and nearly glabrous above, coated beneath, particularly on the midrib and veins, with long white hairs when they unfold, and at maturity 3′—6′ long, 1½′—2′ wide, thick and firm in texture, dark green and slightly lustrous on the upper surface, pale, or glaucous and puberulous on the lower surface and villose along the slender yellow midrib, and primary veins arcuate near the slightly thickened and incurved margins; petiolules pubescent, ¼′—½′ or that of the terminal leaflet up to 2′ in length. Flowers diœcious, appearing with the leaves about the 1st of May, in a rather compact pubescent panicle, with scarious caducous bracts and bractlets; staminate flower with a minute cup-shaped very obscurely dentate calyx and nearly sessile oblong acute anthers; calyx of the pistillate flower much larger and deeply lobed; ovary oblong, gradually narrowed into the slender style divided at apex into 2 short stigmatic lobes. Fruit linear-oblong, in elongated glabrous or puberulous clusters, 1½′—1¾′ long and about ¼′ wide, the wing terminal, only slightly narrowed at the ends, emarginate at apex, and two and a half to three times longer than the short ellipsoid terete many-nerved body.
A tree, 40°—50° high, with a trunk 12′—18′ in diameter, stout ascending or spreading branches forming an open symmetrical head, and stout light or dark gray branchlets soft-pubescent usually during two seasons, much roughened during their first winter and often for two or three years by the large elevated mostly obcordate or sometimes orbicular leaf-scars displaying a marginal line of fibro-vascular bundle-scars. Winter-buds: terminal ovoid, usually broader than long, and covered with bright brown scales, those of the outer pair keeled on the back and apiculate at apex, the others rounded, accrescent, and slightly villose. Bark of the trunk rough, dark gray, and slightly furrowed.
Distribution. Banks of streams and on low river benches; western New Jersey (Bordentown, Burlington County); eastern Pennsylvania (Bucks County); near Arlington, Alexandria County, Great Falls, Fairfax County, Woodbridge, Prince William County, and Clifton Forge, Alleghany County, Virginia; near Easton, Monongalia County, West Virginia, and along the Appalachian Mountains up to altitudes of 2200° to northern Georgia; in northern Alabama (St. Bernard, Cullman County), and westward to eastern Kentucky, central Tennessee and through Ohio northward to Erie County; southern Indiana and Illinois (Richland County), to southeastern Missouri (Campbell, Dunklin County).