Cordwood constitutes the most important use for California live oak. It rates high in fuel value, and the many large and crooked limbs make the tree an ideal one, from the cordwood cutter’s viewpoint. By carefully ricking the wood, with the crooks and elbows in every possible direction--at which some cordwood cutters are very proficient--a cord of wood may be constructed in the forest, which, when sold and delivered in the buyer’s shed, contracts like an accordion. CANYON LIVE OAK (_Quercus chrysolepis_). This splendid California oak bears many names. It is an evergreen, and therefore is called live oak. It is hard when thoroughly seasoned, and this has won for it the name iron oak. Wagon makers often so designate it. It is called Valparaiso oak, but for what reason is not apparent. Black live oak doubtless refers to the dark color of the foliage. The most shapely trees grow in the bottoms of canyons, and the name, canyon live oak, refers to that circumstance. Hickory oak is not an appropriate name, though it doubtless implies that the wood possesses the toughness of hickory. It is about as tough as white oak. The name golden cup oak is a translation of its botanical name which, in Greek, means “golden scale,” a reference to a yellow tomentum or wool which covers the cups of the acorns. The wood’s hardness qualifies it to serve as mauls, hence the name maul oak. The northern limit of its growth is in southern Oregon. It goes south from there on the coast ranges of California and the western slopes of the Sierra Nevadas to the highlands of southern California. Its growth on the mountains of southern Arizona and New Mexico is always shrubby. The lowest limit of its range is about 1,000 feet above sea level, the best specimens occurring at low altitudes in the sheltered canyons of the coast ranges of California. Gradually diminishing in size, it grows to the very tops of many of the high mountains, sometimes reaching 9,000 feet, being not more than a foot high at the upper limits of its range. In appearance this tree resembles the eastern live oak (_Quercus virginiana_), having the same majestic wide-spreading crown, except in the high altitudes where it forms dense thickets covering large areas.