Hickory

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Hickory

Trees in the genus Carya (from Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the historical stage in the development of the Greek language spanning across the Archaic Greece , Classical Greece , and Hellenistic civilization periods of ancient Greece and the classical antiquity....
?????? "nut

Nut (fruit)

Nut is a general term for the large, dry, oily seed or fruit of some plant. While a wide variety of dried seeds and fruits are called nuts, only a certain number of them are considered by biologists to be true nuts....
") are commonly known as Hickory. The genus includes 17–19 species of deciduous

Deciduous

Deciduous means falling off at maturity or tending to fall off and is typically used in reference to trees or shrubs that lose their leaves seasonally and to the shedding of other plant structures such as petals after flowering or fruit when ripe....
trees with pinnately compound leaves

Leaf

In botany, a leaf is an above-ground plant Organ specialized for photosynthesis. For this purpose, a leaf is typically flat and thin, to expose the cells containing chloroplast to light over a broad area, and to allow light to penetrate fully into the tissues....
and large nuts

Nut (fruit)

Nut is a general term for the large, dry, oily seed or fruit of some plant. While a wide variety of dried seeds and fruits are called nuts, only a certain number of them are considered by biologists to be true nuts....
. A dozen or so species are native to North America

North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
(11–12 in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
, 1 in Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federalism constitutionalism republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of Mexico....
), and 5–6 species from China

China

China is a Culture of China, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
and Indochina

Indochina

Indochina, or the Indochinese Peninsula, is a subregion in Southeast Asia. It lies roughly east of India, south of China.The word has French origins, Indochine, and was adopted when French colonizers in Vietnam began expanding their territory to bordering countries....
.

Another Asian species, Beaked Hickory, previously listed as Carya sinensis, is now treated in a separate genus Annamocarya
Annamocarya

Annamocarya is a genus of flowering plants in the family Juglandaceae, containing only one species, Annamocarya sinensis, native to southwestern China and northern Vietnam....
, as Annamocarya sinensis.

Hickory flower

Flower

A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproduction structure found in flowering plants . The biological function of a flower is to mediate the union of male sperm with female ovum in order to produce seeds....
s are small yellow-green catkin

Catkin

A catkin or ament is a slim, cylindrical flower cluster, with inconspicuous or no petals, usually wind-pollination but sometimes insect pollinated ....
s produced in spring.

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Species and classification

In the APG system

APG system

A modern list of systems of plant taxonomy, the APG system of plant classification was published in 1998 by the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group. The system is unusual in being based, not on total evidence, but on the cladistics analysis of the DNA sequences of three genes, two chloroplast genes and one gene coding for ribosomes....
, genus Carya (and the whole Juglandaceae

Juglandaceae

The Juglandaceae, also known as the Walnut Family, is a family of trees, or sometimes shrubs, in the order Fagales. Various members of this family are native to the Americas, Eurasia, and Southeast Asia....
family) has been recently moved to the Fagales

Fagales

The Fagales are an order of flowering plants, including some of the best known trees. The order name is derived from genus Fagus, Beeches....
order.

North America

Carya sect. Carya — typical hickories

Carya floridana Sarg. - Scrub Hickory
Carya glabra Pignut Hickory, Pignut, Sweet Pignut, Coast Pignut Hickory, Smoothbark Hickory, Swamp Hickory, Broom Hickory
Carya myristiciformis (F.Michx.) Nutt. - Nutmeg Hickory, Swamp Hickory, Bitter Water Hickory
Carya ovalis
Carya ovalis

Carya ovalis, the Red Hickory, is a species of tree belonging to the Hickory and the larger Walnut family of trees. The tree was once considered by many botanists to have been a hybrid species between the Shagbark Hickory and the Pignut Hickory but is now considered an individual species on its own....
Red Hickory, Spicebark Hickory, Sweet Pignut Hickory (treated as a synonym of C. glabra by Flora N. Amer.)
Carya ovata (Mill.) K.Koch - Shagbark Hickory

Carya ovata var. ovata Northern Shagbark Hickory
Carya ovata var. australis Southern Shagbark Hickory, Carolina Hickory (syn. C. carolinae-septentrionalis)

Carya laciniosa (Mill.) K.Koch - Shellbark Hickory, Shagbark Hickory, Bigleaf Shagbark Hickory, Kingnut, Big Shellbark, Bottom Shellbark, Thick Shellbark, Western Shellbark
Carya pallida Sand Hickory
Carya texana lack Hickory
Carya tomentosa (syn. C. alba) Mockernut Hickory

Carya sect. Apocarya — pecans

Carya aquatica
Carya aquatica

Carya aquatica is a large tree, that can grow over 30 meters 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....
Water Hickory
Carya cordiformis Bitternut Hickory
Carya illinoinensis Pecan
Carya palmeri Mexican Hickory

Asia

Carya sect. Sinocarya — Asian hickories

Carya dabieshanensis Dabie Shan Hickory (may be synonymous with C. cathayensis)
Carya cathayensis Chinese Hickory
Carya hunanensis Hunan Hickory
Carya kweichowensis Guizhou Hickory
Carya poilanei Poilane's Hickory
Carya tonkinensis Vietnamese Hickory

Hickory is used as a food plant by the larva

Larva

A larva is a young form of animal with indirect developmental biology, going through or undergoing metamorphosis .The larva can look completely different from the adult form, for example, a caterpillar differs from a butterfly....
e of some Lepidoptera

Lepidoptera

Lepidoptera is an order of insect that includes moths and butterfly. It is one of the most speciose orders in the class Insecta, encompassing moths and the three superfamilies of butterfly, skipper , and Hedylidae....
species. These include:

Brown-tail
Brown-tail

The Brown-tail is a moth of the family Lymantriidae. It is distributed throughout Europe.The wings of this species are pure white, as is the body, apart from a tuft of brown hairs at the end of the abdomen....
(Euproctis chrysorrhoea)
the Coleophora
Coleophora

Coleophora is a very large genus of moths of the family Coleophoridae with around 1000 described species. The genus is represented on all continents but the majority are found in the Nearctic and Palaearctic regions....
case-bearers C. laticornella and C. ostryae.
Regal moth (Citheronia regalis), whose caterpillars are known as hickory horn-devil
Walnut Sphinx (Amorpha juglandis)

Another insect that uses the hickory tree as a food source is the hickory leaf stem gall phylloxera (Phylloxera caryaecaulis). Phylloxeridae are related to aphids and have a similarly complex life cycle. Eggs hatch in early spring and the galls quickly form around the developing insects. Phylloxera galls may damage weakened or stressed hickories, but are generally harmless. Deformed leaves and twigs can rain down from the tree in the spring as squirrels break off infected tissue and eat the galls, possibly for the protein content of the phylloxera, or possibly because the galls are fleshy and tasty to the squirrels.

Tryma

Some fruits are borderline and difficult to categorize. Hickory nuts (Carya) and Walnuts (Juglans) in the Juglandaceae

Juglandaceae

Drupe

In botany, a drupe is a fruit in which an outer fleshy part surrounds a shell of hardened endocarp with a seed inside. These fruits develop from a single carpel, and mostly from flowers with superior ovary....
s or drupaceous nuts, and thus not true botanical nuts. Tryma is a specialized term for such nut-like drupes.

Uses

Hickory wood

Wood

Wood is an organic material; in the strict sense wood is produced as secondary xylem in the stems of woody plants, notably trees but also shrubs, etc....
is extremely tough, yet flexible, and is valued for tool

Tool

A broad definition of a tool is an entity used to interface between two or more domains that facilitates more effective action of one domain upon the other....
handles, bows

Bow (weapon)

A bow is a weapon that projects arrows powered by the elasticity of the bow. Essentially, it is a form of Spring . As the bow is drawn, energy is stored in the limbs of the bow and transformed into rapid motion when the string is released, with the string transferring this force to the arrow....
(like yew

Taxus

Taxus is a genus of yews, small Pinophyta trees or shrubs in the yew family Taxaceae. They are relatively slow growing and can be very long-lived, and reach heights of 1-40 m, with trunk diameters of up to 4 m....
), wheel

Wheel

A wheel is a circular device that is capable of rotating on its axis, facilitating movement or transportation whilst supporting a load , or performing labour in machines....
spokes, cart

Cart

A cart is a vehicle or device designed for transport, using two or four wheels and normally pulled by one or a pair of draught animals. A handcart is pulled or pushed by one or more people....
s, drumsticks, lacrosse

Lacrosse

Lacrosse is a team sport originated by several tribes of Native Americans in the United States. There are four distinct versions of the modern game: men's field lacrosse, women's field lacrosse, men's box lacrosse and intercrosse ....
stick handles, golf club

Golf club (equipment)

Golf clubs are used in the sport of golf to hit a golf ball. Each club is composed of a shaft with a lance and a clubhead. woods are used for long-distance fairway shots; iron , the most versatile class used for a variety of shots, and putter , used mainly on the green to roll the ball into the cup....
shafts (sometimes still called hickory stick, even though made of steel

Steel

Steel is an alloy consisting mostly of iron, with a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.14% by weight , depending on grade. Carbon is the most cost-effective alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten....
or graphite

Carbon fiber

Carbon fiber or is a material consisting of extremely thin fibers about 0.005?0.010 mm in diameter and composed mostly of carbon atoms. The carbon atoms are bonded together in microscopic crystals that are more or less aligned parallel to the long axis of the fiber....
), the bottom of skis, walking stick

Walking stick

A walking stick is a device used by many people to facilitate balancing whilst walking. It may be used as a defensive or offensive weapon, and may conceal a knife or sword as in a swordstick....
s and for punitive use as a switch

Switch (rod)

A switch is a flexible rod, typically used for physical punishment of the birching type, called switching after it, especially when using a single branch: multiple branches are rather called a rod, a less flexible single rod is rather called a caning, an inflexible one a stick; a paddle is broader but hard and flattened....
(like hazel

Hazel

The hazels are a genus of deciduous trees and large shrubs native to the temperate northern hemisphere. The genus is usually placed in the birch family Betulaceae, though some botanists split the hazels into a separate family Corylaceae.Hazel plants prefer a nice warm, mild,moist climate nothing more nothing less....
), and especially as a cane-like hickory stick

Caning

Caning is a physical punishment consisting of a number of hits with a wooden cane#Disciplinary implement, generally applied to the bare or clad buttocks , shoulder, hand or the soles of the foot ....
in schools. Baseball

Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport of nine players each. The goal of baseball is to score run by hitting a thrown Baseball with a baseball bat and touching a series of four markers called base arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot square, or diamond. Players on one team take turns hitting against...
bats

Baseball bat

A baseball bat is a smooth wooden or metal Club used in the game of baseball to hit the Baseball after the ball is thrown by the pitcher . It is no more than 2.75 inches in diameter at the thickest part and no more than 42 inches in length....
were formerly made of hickory but are now more commonly made of ash

Ash tree

Fraxinus is a genus of usually medium to large trees, mostly deciduous though a few subtropical species are evergreen. The leaf are opposite , and mostly pinnately-compound, simple in a few species....
. Hickory is also highly prized for wood-burning stove

Wood-burning stove

A wood-burning stove is a heating appliance capable of burning wood fuel and wood-derived biomass fuel. Generally the appliance consists of a solid metal closed fire chamber, a grate and an adjustable air control....
s, because of its high energy content. Hickory wood is also a preferred type for smoke curing

Curing (food preservation)

Curing refers to various food preservation and flavoring processes, especially of meat or fish, by the addition of a combination of edible salt, sugar, nitrates or nitrite....
meats. In the Southern United States

Southern United States

The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive region in the southeastern and south-central United States....
, hickory is popular for cooking barbecue

Barbecue

Barbecue or barbeque is a method and apparatus for cooking food, often meat, with the heat and hot gases of a fire, smoking wood, or hot coals of charcoal and may include application of a marinade, spice rub, or Basting barbecue sauce to the meat....
, as hickory grows abundantly in the region, and adds flavor to the meat. Hickory is sometimes used for wood flooring

Wood flooring

Wood flooring is a type of flooring made from the timber of hardwoods, or of spruce or hard pine. There are two basic manufactured types of hardwood....
due to its durability and character.

A bark

BARK

BARK was an early Electromechanics. BARK was built using standard phone relays, implementing a 32-bit binary machine and could perform addition in 150 ms and multiplication in 250 ms....
extract from shagbark hickory is also used in an edible syrup that is similar to maple syrup

Maple syrup

Maple syrup is a sweetener made from the sap of maple trees. In Canada and the United States it is most often eaten with waffles and pancakes. It is sometimes used as an ingredient in baking, the making of candy, preparing desserts, or as a sugar source and flavoring agent in making beer....
, with a slightly bitter, smoky taste.

The nut

Nut (fruit)

Nut is a general term for the large, dry, oily seed or fruit of some plant. While a wide variety of dried seeds and fruits are called nuts, only a certain number of them are considered by biologists to be true nuts....
s of some species are palatable, while others are bitter and only suitable for animal feed. Shagbark and Shellbark Hickories, along with the Pecan

Pecan

The Pecan is a species of hickory, native to south-central North America, in the United States from southern Iowa, Illinois and Indiana east to western Kentucky, North Carolina and western Tennessee, south through Georgia , Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas ; and in Mexico from Coahuila south to Jalisco and Veracr...
, are regarded by some as the finest nut trees.

When cultivated for their nuts, note that because of their self-incompatibility, clonal (grafted) trees of the same cultivar

Cultivar

A cultivar is a cultivated plant that has been selected and given a unique name because of its decorative or useful characteristics; it is usually distinct from similar plants and when Plant propagation it retains those characteristics....
cannot pollinate each other. Two or more cultivars must be planted together for successful pollination

Pollination

Pollination in flowering plants and gymnosperms is the process that transfers pollen, which contain the male gametes to where the female gamete are contained within the carpel; in gymnosperms the pollen is directly applied to the ovule itself....
. Seedlings (grown from hickory nuts) will usually have sufficient genetic variation.

External links

Large-format diagnostic photos, Morton Arboretum
Morton Arboretum

The Morton Arboretum, in Lisle, Illinois, Illinois, covers 1,700 acres and is made up of gardens of various plant types and collections of trees from specific taxonomical and geographical areas....
acc. 29-U-10

Hickory

Species and classification

Tryma

Uses

See also

External links