Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, Volume III, 1863-1867Various
Science
Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, Volume III, 1863-1867
Various
California Academy of Sciences -- Periodicals; Science -- Periodicals
12. _Quercus agrifolia_, Nées. (Live Oak.)
Oakland! Banks of Sacramento River! Clear Lake! Russian River
Valley! Anderson Valley! Monterey!
Foliage extremely variable. On river banks and in expositions
close to the coast, where it is almost daily enveloped in
fogs, this species exhibits quite a uniformity; the figure of
_Quercus oxyadenia_ in Sitgreaves’ Report represents this form
of it very well. In the valleys of the interior the shape of
the leaves of one and the same tree is very different. Some
have entire margins, while others have them pretty deeply
dentated, often one side is entire and the other dentate.
Some trees occur of which the young shoots have the leaves
“coarsely sinuate-toothed, or obliquely sinuate-toothed;
teeth very sharply acute with a broad base, cuspidate-awned,”
and thus agree with Dr. Kellogg’s _Quercus Morehus_—while
the older branches have much smaller and entire leaves. In
Anderson Valley I saw several trees whose entire foliage agrees
admirably with Dr. Kellogg’s. Had I not seen that tree on the
shore of Borax Lake exhibiting both forms, I should be inclined
to call it a good species. The cups of the acorns of these
trees have the scales long and loosely imbricated, and the
acorn is almost entirely immerged; but this is also the case
with those of some trees that have a far different foliage.
Thus far I have not been able to find good, distinctive,
reliable characters. There are transitions in all parts, even
on the same tree. As the tree has the habit of growing in
groups, one might suppose that trees of one group, at least,
should show a uniformity in botanical characters; this is not
so: just the very extremes may be found in one and the same
group. This phenomenon I observed throughout the whole length
of Anderson Valley, a distance of some eighteen miles. On dry
gravelly hillsides in the interior this tree presents still
another form: _Quercus Wislizeni_, Englm.
The acorns ripen annually and differ also essentially in shape
and size. Soil, climate, and exposition, offer in this case
no satisfactory explanation for so great a variation in one
species. Should it not be attributed to intrinsic peculiarities?
13. _Quercus Garryana_, Hook. (White Oak.)
On dry easterly hillsides and in valleys on a poor buff-colored
clay. Santa Rosa Valley! Clear Lake! Searsville! Anderson
Valley! San José Valley!
Exposition and soil agree in all these localities.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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