Kingdom Plantae Family Fagaceae Scientific name Quercus prinoides Rank Species | Order Fagales Genus Quercus Higher classification Oak | |
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Similar Oak, Quercus muehlenbergii, Quercus ilicifolia, Quercus michauxii, Quercus arkansana | ||
Quercus prinoides, commonly known as dwarf chinkapin oak, dwarf chinquapin oak, dwarf chestnut oak or scrub chestnut oak, is a shrubby, clone-forming oak native to eastern and central North America, ranging from New Hampshire to the Carolinian forest zone of southern Ontario to eastern Nebraska, south to Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, and Oklahoma. It has a virtually disjunct (discontinuous) distribution, fairly common in New England and in the Appalachian Mountains, and also in the eastern Great Plains but rare in the Ohio Valley in between.
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Classification and nomenclature
Quercus prinoides was named and described by the German botanist Karl (Carl) Ludwig Willdenow in 1801, in a German journal article by the German-American Pennsylvania botanist Gotthilf Heinrich Ernst Muhlenberg. The epithet prinoides refers to its resemblance to Quercus prinus, the chestnut oak.
However, this shrubby oak, now generally accepted as a distinct species, is more closely related to chinkapin oak (Quercus muhlenbergii) than to chestnut oak. These two kinds of oak have sometimes been considered to be conspecific (belonging to the same species), in which case the earlier-published name Q. prinoides has priority, with the larger chinkapin oak then usually classified as Quercus prinoides var. acuminata, and the shrubby form as Q. prinoides var. prinoides.
Description
The dwarf chinkapin oak is a shrub or small tree that typically only grows to 13–20 feet (4–6 meters) tall and 13–20 feet (4–6 meters) wide. It sometimes spreads vegetatively by means of underground rhizomes. The leaves of dwarf chinkapin oak closely resemble those of chinkapin oak, although they are smaller: 2-6 inches (5–15 cm) long, compared to 4-7 inches (10–18 cm) long for chinkapin oak. The acorns are 1/2 to 1 inches (15–25 mm) long, with the cup enclosing about half of the acorn.
While similar in foliage and fruits, but with smaller leaves, the dwarf chinkapin oak may also be distinguished from the chinkapin oak by differences in growth habit (the clonally spreading shrubby growth form and smaller proportions of dwarf chinkapin oak, even when grown on rich soils) and habitat (the chinkapin oak is typically found on rocky, calcareous sites, while the dwarf chinkapin oak is more typically found on dry, often acidic, sandy soils or dry shales).
Ecology and uses
The acorns of dwarf chinkapin oak are sweet tasting and relished by humans and many kinds of wildlife. The wood has little commercial value because of the shrub's small size.