[Illustration: PIGNUT HICKORY] PIGNUT HICKORY (_Hicoria Glabra_) The name of this tree is unfortunate, although so far as the nuts are concerned, no injustice is done. It is one of the best hickories in the quality of its wood, and also as an ornamental tree. It is likewise abundant in many parts of its range, which extends from Maine to Kansas, Texas, Florida, and throughout most of the territory enclosed by the boundary lines thus delimited. The name pignut is common in New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and Minnesota; bitternut in Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin; black hickory in Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, and Indiana; broom hickory in Missouri; brown hickory in Mississippi, Delaware, Texas, Tennessee, Minnesota; hardshell in West Virginia; red hickory in Delaware; switch bud hickory in Alabama; and white hickory in New Hampshire and Iowa. The nuts are generally bitter, but some trees bear fruit which is not very offensive to the taste. The avidity with which swine feed upon it gives the common name. This tree is doubtless confused many times with bitternut, though their differences are enough to distinguish them readily if they grow side by side. As far as the woods of the two species are concerned, there is little occasion to keep them separate. The pignut is a forked tree more frequently than any other species of hickory; and the nuts vary in shape and size more than those of any other. The tree is more remarkable for its variations than for its regularity. In one thing, however, it is pretty constant: the limbs and branches are smooth and clean, hence the botanical name _glabra_. As a name for this tree, smooth hickory would be preferable to pignut. Trunks attain a height of eighty or ninety feet and a diameter of three or four, but the extreme sizes are rare. The largest specimens are found in the lower Ohio valley, and the species is most common in Missouri and Arkansas. It grows farther south and farther west than any other hickory except pecan. Its southern limit is in Florida and its western in Texas.