8. Quercus pagoda Raf. (cherrybark oak)

Quercus falcata Michx. var. pagodifolia Elliott

Pl. 414 i; Map 1846

Plants trees to 40 m tall. Bark medium to dark gray, divided into square blocks or plates, the inner bark orange. Twigs 2–4 mm wide, dark brown, densely pubescent with branched, spreading hairs when young, sometimes becoming more or less glabrous with age. Buds 5–7 mm long, brown, pubescent or the lower scales glabrous except along the margins. Petioles 27–45 mm long. Leaf blade 12–19 cm long, 10–15 cm wide, broadly obtuse or rounded-obtuse to nearly truncate at the base, divided 70–80% of the width, the lobes (2)3 or 4 per side, these evenly spaced, the median lobes usually the largest, the basalmost lobes 1.0–2.5 cm above the blade base in most or all leaves; well-developed lobes 15–30 mm wide, narrowly triangular, rarely almost oblong, usually tapered apically, occasionally rounded-obtuse or acute, undivided or with a strong tooth (rarely a secondary lobe) on the lower margin, each with 1–4 bristles 3–4 mm long (the whole blade with 10–20 marginal bristles), the strongest secondary veins reaching the margin at the tips of the lobes and ending in bristles, others reaching toward sinuses and turning aside before reaching the margin; the upper surface dull or somewhat shiny, with small branched spreading hairs when young, by midsummer usually with only scattered hairs near the midvein, the undersurface green or white, with moderately to densely crowded 7–11-rayed, spreading hairs and often also inconspicuous, unbranched, appressed hairs over the whole surface, usually felty to the touch, the vein axils with tufts of 5–15-rayed, often stalked hairs. Acorn cups 6–8 mm long, 17–18 mm wide, covering 30–60% of the nut, bowl-shaped, the inner surface smooth, densely hairy, the outer surface with the scales thin and plane or weakly convex-thickened, pubescent. Nuts 10–12 mm long, 11–12 mm wide, depressed-ovoid, without distinct concentric grooves around the tip. April–May.

Scattered in the Mississippi Lowlands Division and adjacent portions of the Ozarks and Ozark Border (southeastern U.S. west to Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas). Bottomland forests, mesic upland forests, sand savannas, sand prairies, banks of stream and rivers, oxbows, sloughs, and swamps; also roadsides.

Morphological variation in Q. pagoda was analyzed statistically by R. J. Jensen (1989). It is very closely related to Q. falcata, which sometimes occurs in slightly drier habitats in the same region, and the two have sometimes been considered varieties of a single species (Steyermark, 1963). Hybrids involving Q. pagoda are rare in Missouri, with only the hybrid involving Q. velutina documented thus far.