Quercus pacifica |
Quercus ajoensis |
|
---|---|---|
Channel Island scrub oak, island scrub oak, Pacific oak |
Ajo Mountain scrub oak |
|
Habit | Shrubs, rarely small trees, subevergreen, shrubs to 2 m, trees to 5 m or taller. | Shrubs, rarely trees, evergreen, to 2-3 m. Bark gray, scaly or furrowed. |
Bark | scaly on older branches and trunk. |
|
Twigs | brownish or reddish, minutely puberulent, becoming glabrate and gray with age. |
light brown, 1-2 mm diam., inconspicuously short stellate-pubescent or glabrate. |
Buds | light or chestnut brown, ovate or globose, 2-3 × 1-2 mm. |
brown or reddish brown, ovoid or globose, 1-1.5 mm, variously short stellate-pubescent, tomentose, or glabrate. |
Leaves | blade obovate or oblong, planar to moderately convex or undulate, 15-40 × 7-20(-40) mm, base cuneate or rounded, attenuate-decurrent along petiole, margins minutely cartilaginous, entire or with 1-5 irregular teeth on each side, secondary veins obscure, 1-5 on each side, apex blunt or rounded, occasionally subacute with mucronate tip; surfaces abaxially waxy, glandular, with scattered minute, flat, appressed, ± 8-rayed stellate hairs, not obscuring surface, adaxially green, glossy, glabrate or with minute, scattered, stellate hairs. |
petiole (2-)3-4 m. Leaf blade ovate to narrowly ovate or oblong, (10-)15-35(-50) × (5-)10-20(-30) mm, rather leathery, base cordate, rarely rounded, margins crispate, sometimes flat, cartilaginous, with 4-6(-8) long-attenuate, spinose-awned teeth on each side, secondary veins 5-8 on each side, whitish, apex acute or obtuse with bristly distal teeth; surfaces abaxially blue-green, waxy-glaucous, microscopically papillose, glabrous, sometimes sparsely stellate-pubescent along midrib, adaxially blue-green, glaucous, glabrous or sparingly stellate-pubescent along midrib, secondary veins raised on both surfaces. |
Acorns | paired or solitary in leaf axil, subsessile, rarely pedunculate in teratological forms; cup hemispheric to turbinate, to 15 mm deep × 20 mm wide, enclosing only 1/4-1/2 nut, scales moderately to heavily tuberculate, irregularly formed; nut light brown, acute-cylindric or fusiform, tapered, (15-)20-30 × (6-)9-15 m, apex acute, glabrate. |
solitary or paired on thin axillary peduncle (5-)30-50 mm; cup shallowly cup-shaped, thin, 3-4 mm deep × 6-8(-10) mm wide, enclosing only base of nut, scales brownish, moderately tuberculate, pubescent; nut oblong to narrowly ovoid, 12-15 × 5-8 mm. |
Cotyledons | distinct. |
distinct. |
Quercus pacifica |
Quercus ajoensis |
|
Phenology | Flowering spring. | Flowering in spring. |
Habitat | Chaparral, oak woodlands, margins of grasslands, understory in closed-cone pine stands | Rare to locally abundant on igneous slopes |
Elevation | 0-300 m (0-1000 ft) | 500-1500 m (1600-4900 ft) |
Distribution |
CA
|
AZ; Mexico (Baja California) |
Discussion | Of conservation concern. Quercus pacifica is endemic on three of the California Channel Islands: Santa Cruz, Santa Catalina, and Santa Rosa. It is not known from the mainland, but it bears a superficial similarity to some of the tree forms that are putative hybrids between Q. engelmannii and Q. cornelius-mulleri in San Diego County. The latter populations, sometimes treated as Q. ×acutidens, differ in having much greater variability in leaf shape; thicker, more leathery leaves; denser abaxial leaf vestiture; much smaller hairs, having more than 10 rays; and variable levels of connation of cotyledons (always distinct in Q. pacifica). Quercus pacifica appears to be most closely related to Q. douglasii, whether by direct descent or by introgression with another species no longer extant on the islands. Quercus ×macdonaldii Greene (as a species) [= Quercus dumosa var. macdonaldii (Greene) Jepson] is a stabilized hybrid complex between Quercus pacifica and Q. lobata Née. The plants tend to be small to moderate trees with leaves that resemble those of Q. lobata; the leaves are much more shallowly lobed and always less than two-thirds the distance from the margin to the midrib. Quercus ×macdonaldii is known from Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, and Santa Catalina islands. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Populations of Quercus ajoensis in southern New Mexico show characteristics suggesting introgression from hybridization with Quercus toumeyi, such as increased twig and leaf pubescence and sometimes the prominent golden puberulum of the abaxial leaf surfaces. Hybrids between Q. ajoensis and both Q. turbinella and Q. gambelii (Utah) are also known. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 3. | FNA vol. 3. |
Parent taxa | Fagaceae > Quercus > sect. Quercus | Fagaceae > Quercus > sect. Quercus |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | Q. dumosa var. polycarpa | Q. turbinella subsp. ajoensis, Q. turbinella var. ajoensis |
Name authority | Nixon & C. H. Muller: Novon 4: 391. (1994) | C. H. Muller: Madroño 12: 140. (1954) |
Web links |