| Scrub hickory | |
|---|---|
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| Compound leaf of the scrub hickory | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Eudicots |
| Clade: | Rosids |
| Order: | Fagales |
| Family: | Juglandaceae |
| Genus: | Carya |
| Section: | Carya sect. Carya |
| Species: | C. floridana |
| Binomial name | |
| Carya floridana | |
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| Natural range of Carya floridana | |
Carya floridana (syn. Hicoria floridana) the scrub hickory, is a small tree native to the Southeast United States, where it is endemic to central Florida.
Although Carya floridana can grow to the height of 25 m (80 ft), most specimens are shrubs 3–5 m tall, with many small trunks. The leaves are 20–30 cm long, pinnate, with three to seven leaflets, each leaflet 4–10 cm long and 2–4 cm broad, with a coarsely toothed margin. The fruit is a nut 3–4 cm long and 2-2.5 cm diameter, with a thick, hard shell and a sweet, edible seed. The seeds require stratification to germinate.
Scrub hickories are deciduous. Most scrub hickories are small, resembling shrubs. The bark of the scrub hickory is a light gray, and the texture can vary from smooth to fissured. Branches are a reddish-brown color, and can be scaly or glabrous. [3] The leaves are compound, and are usually yellowish green. Leaflets are 3 to 5, but some occasionally have 7. Older leaves have a rusty tint on the underside. Outer leaf buds are also covered in rust colored scales. The flowers are pistillate and staminate, which consist of 3 branched catkins, and tightly crowded clusters. The nuts of the scrub hickory are oblong-oval shaped. The nut is thick shelled and hard to crack. Only one nut per flower cluster matures. The meat of the nut is sweet and high in nutritional value, more so than the other Carya and Quercus species it co-occurs with. The scrub hickory can hybridize with the Pignut hickory (Carya glabra). [4]
Carya floridana is geographically separated from the similar black hickory ( Carya texana ). The scrub hickory intergrades with the pignut hickory (Carya glabra) where ranges overlap. The Scrub Hickory is in the Order Fagales, and in the family Juglandaceae. The Scrub Hickory was identified and named by Charles Sprague Sargent. The original Latin name was Hicorius floridana, but it has since been revised. Close relatives include the Pignut Hickory (Carya glabra), the Black Hickory (Carya texicana), and the Sand Hickory (Carya pallida). [4]
Scrub hickory is a 64-chromosome species. [5]
The Scrub hickory is host to many organisms, such as Burrowing Wolf Spiders (Geolycosa sp.). The most common species associated with scrub hickory include the Archbold's Burrowing Wolf Spider (G.xera archibaldi) [6] . Longhorn beetles (Cerambycidae) are also common on scrub hickories. The beetle, Ancylocera bicolor uses the scrub hickory as a host plant. [7]
The Scrub hickory is native to Florida, and no records of it are found in other southeastern states. The scrub hickory is found in De Soto, Orange and Volusia counties. The scrub hickory may also be found around the Pensacola Bay and Jupiter Island. [8]
Scrub hickories propagate well in sandy, loamy or clay soils. Well drained soils are preferred. The optimum soil pH is a mildly basic, neutral or mildly alkaline. US Hardiness zones for the scrub hickory are from Zone 8 to Zone 10. It is unknown what other hardiness zones the scrub hickory can tolerate, but it is inferred that the scrub hickory could propagate well within other parts of the lower southeastern US states. The scrub hickory is tolerant of moist or dry soils. It is a shade intolerant tree. [9] Scrub hickories cannot tolerate brackish or salt water and they cannot tolerate salty spray or wind. Optimal planting time is through April to May [10] The scrub hickory is a good tree species for landscaping in some situations due to its diminutive size.
Scrub hickories are commonly used as food sources by multiple animals, the nuts are high in protein and fat. The nuts contain macronutrients such as copper, zinc, iron, and other minerals. As with most hickories, the nuts are of scrub hickory are edible. They are not commonly consumed because the nuts are hard to open. [10] Common birds that feed on the scrub hickory include the Florida Scrub Jay, the blue jay, the red bellied woodpecker and the red headed woodpecker. Larger mammals such as bears, raccoons, foxes, mice and feral hogs are reported to eat the nuts of the scrub hickory. It is unclear if the scrub hickory is used for lumber. A railroad station in Highlands county is named after the scrub hickory, its name was changed from "Red Hills" to "Hicoria", as is the local post office. [4]
The pecan is a species of hickory native to the southern United States and northern Mexico in the region of the Mississippi River.
Hickory is a common name for trees composing the genus Carya, which includes around 18 species. Five or six species are native to China, Indochina, and India (Assam), as many as twelve are native to the United States, four are found in Mexico, and two to four are native to Canada. A number of hickory species are used for their edible nuts, lumber or other wood and woodcraft products.
Juglans nigra, the eastern American black walnut, is a species of deciduous tree in the walnut family, Juglandaceae, native to North America. It grows mostly in riparian zones, from southern Ontario, west to southeast South Dakota, south to Georgia, northern Florida and southwest to central Texas. Wild trees in the upper Ottawa Valley may be an isolated native population or may have derived from planted trees.
Aesculus glabra, commonly known as Ohio buckeye, is a species of tree in the soapberry family (Sapindaceae) native to North America.
Carya ovata, the shagbark hickory, is a common hickory in the Eastern United States and southeast Canada. It is a large, deciduous tree, growing well over 100 ft (30 m) tall, and can live more than 350 years. The tallest measured shagbark, located in Savage Gulf, Tennessee, is over 150 ft (46 m) tall. Mature shagbarks are easy to recognize because, as their name implies, they have shaggy bark. This characteristic is, however, only found on mature trees; young specimens have smooth bark.
Aesculus flava, also known commonly as the common buckeye, the sweet buckeye, and the yellow buckeye, is a species of deciduous tree in the subfamily Hippocastanoideae of the family Sapindaceae. The species is native to the Ohio Valley and Appalachian Mountains of the Eastern United States. It grows in mesophytic forest or floodplains, generally in acid to circumneutral soil, reaching a height of 20m to 48m.
Carya sinensis is a species of tree native to southwestern China and northern Vietnam, in the hickory genus Carya. It is sometimes called Chinese hickory or beaked hickory. It is closely related to Carya kweichowensis.
Carya cordiformis, the bitternut hickory, also called bitternut, yellowbud hickory, or swamp hickory, is a large pecan hickory with commercial stands located mostly north of the other pecan hickories. Bitternut hickory is cut and sold in mixture with the true hickories. It is the shortest-lived of the hickories, living to about 200 years.
The Appalachian mixed mesophytic forests is an ecoregion of the temperate broadleaf and mixed forests biome, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund. It consists of mesophytic plants west of the Appalachian Mountains in the Southeastern United States.
Carya glabra, the pignut hickory, is a common, but not abundant species of hickory in the oak-hickory forest association in the Eastern United States and Canada. Other common names are pignut, sweet pignut, coast pignut hickory, smoothbark hickory, swamp hickory, and broom hickory. The pear-shaped nut ripens in September and October, has a sweet maple like smell, and is an important part of the diet of many wild animals. The wood is used for a variety of products, including fuel for home heating. Its leaves turn yellow in the Fall.
Carya laciniosa, the shellbark hickory, in the Juglandaceae or walnut family is also called kingnut, big, bottom, thick, or western shellbark, attesting to some of its characteristics. It is a slow-growing, long-lived tree, hard to transplant because of its long taproot, and subject to insect damage. The nuts, largest of all hickory nuts, are sweet and edible. Wildlife and people harvest most of them; those remaining produce seedling trees readily. The wood is hard, heavy, strong, and very flexible, making it a favored wood for tool handles. A specimen tree has been reported in Missouri with 117 cm (46 in) diameter at breast height, 36.9 m tall, and a spread of 22.6 m.
Carya tomentosa, commonly known as mockernut hickory, mockernut, white hickory, whiteheart hickory, hognut, bullnut, is a species of tree in the walnut family Juglandaceae. The most abundant of the hickories, and common in the eastern half of the United States, it is long lived, sometimes reaching the age of 500 years. A straight-growing hickory, a high percentage of its wood is used for products where strength, hardness, and flexibility are needed. The wood makes excellent fuel wood, as well. The leaves turn yellow in Autumn.
Carya aquatica, the bitter pecan or water hickory, is a large tree, that can grow over 30 metres (98 ft) tall of the Juglandaceae or walnut family. In the American South it is a dominant plant species found on clay flats and backwater areas near streams and rivers. The species reproduces aggressively both by seed and sprouts from roots and from stumps of cut trees. Water hickory is a major component of wetland forests now in the south eastern US, because of the selective cutting of more desirable tree species for the lumber industry. It is considered important in cleansing drainage waters since the plants slow water flow during flooding, allowing sediments to fall out of the water column. This tree species is tolerant of wet soils but grows best on well draining soils near rivers and other water ways.
Carya myristiciformis, the nutmeg hickory, a tree of the Juglandaceae or walnut family, also called swamp hickory or bitter water hickory, is found as small, possibly relict populations across the Southern United States and in northern Mexico on rich moist soils of higher bottom lands and stream banks. Little is known of the growth rate of nutmeg hickory. Logs and lumber are sold mixed with other hickories. The nuts are an oil-rich food for wildlife.
Carya ovalis, the red hickory or sweet pignut hickory, is a fairly uncommon but widespread hickory native to eastern North America. It is typically found growing in dry, well drained sandy upland ridges and sloped woodlands from southern Ontario, Canada, and in the United States east to New Hampshire, south to northern Florida west to eastern Texas and north-west to Nebraska. This species was formerly treated as a variety or northern ecotype of the pignut hickory C. glabra, described as Carya glabra var. odorata. This discrepancy has not yet been completely resolved, and some sources and authors still consider red hickory as a variety or synonym of pignut hickory. However both trees are quite morphologically distinct.
Oak–hickory forest is a type of North American forest ecosystem, and an ecoregion of the Temperate broadleaf and mixed forests Biome.
The Southeastern conifer forests are a temperate coniferous forest ecoregion of the southeastern United States. It is the largest conifer forest ecoregion east of the Mississippi River. It is also the southernmost instance of temperate coniferous forest within the Nearctic realm.
The Southern coastal plain oak dome and hammock is a forest type occurring in small patches in Florida, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. These forests consist of thick stands of evergreen oaks on shallow depressions or slight hills. They are distinct from their surrounding habitats, which are often woodlands dominated by longleaf pine.
Carya pallida, sand hickory, or pale hickory is a species of hickory native to the southeastern United States. It is a perennial, dicotyledonous plant which prefers rocky or sandy habitats. The sand hickory can reach heights of up to 30m, but its typical height is between 9-24m. In an open area, Carya crowns are usually towering and slim. The sand hickory nut is edible and consumed by various organisms.
