GREEN HAW (Cratnus viridis, Linn.). n to 35 feet. Round-headed tree with tall, often fluted trunk, and spreading branches, ending in smooth, slim, gray or red-brown twigs. Thorns slender, sharp, pale, less than 1 inch long; oftener wanting. Bark checked into plates, thin, scaly, orange. brown, or ashy gray. Wood like that of preceding species. Leaves obovate, tapering to both extremities, serrate and ' lobed above middle, plain below, dark green, lustrous above, pale, dull beneath; 1 to 3 inches long, with prominent veins and midrib. Flowers March to May, white, I inch across, smooth; anthers yellow; styles 5; clusters dense. Fruit flattened, scarlet, pea-size, in pendent clusters, many-fruited; flesh thin, dry; nutlets 5, scarcely ridged. Dist.: Savannah River ,westward to eastern Texas; north to St. Louis. Ex tensive thickets in Louisiana and eastern Texas. Valuable for ornamental planting, for its scarlet autumn foliage.
HAW (Cratagus apiomorpha, Sarg.). 10 to 45 feet. Short trunked, pyramidal tree with many branches, ascending, or shrubby, many-stemmed, spreading into clumps. Thorns short, straight, slender, red-brown, becoming gray; 1 to 11 inches long; often wanting. Bark gray, cracking into plates, and showing yellow underlayer. Leaves thick, leathery, shining, blue-green, pale beneath, 11 to 21 inches long, ovate or oblong, serrate almost to base, irregularly lobed above middle; petioles slender, winged at apex. Flowers May, in
crowded corymbs, small, white, hairy, anthers 5, pink. Fruit September, in drooping clusters of 3 to 5, pea-sized, red-purple, obovate, with thin flesh, juicy, acid; calyx lobes spreading, soon falling; nutlets 3 to 5, with low ridge on back. Dist.: Borders of dry woodlands near Chicago.
HAW (Cratcegus aprica, Beadl.). 15 to 20 feet. Slender. trunked, spreading tree, with zigzag branchlets. Often a many-stemmed shrub. Thorns straight, slender, brown, 1 to 14 inches long. Bark dark gray, deeply cut between scaly plates. Leaves rhomboidal or obovate, finely saw-toothed and faintly lobed; 1 inch long, thick, shiny, yellow-green, paler beneath; petioles winged. Flowers few, in corymbs, small, on downy stems, stamens 10, anthers yellow, small; styles 3 to 5. Fruit 2 to 3 in a cluster, late, z inch in diameter, flattened, dull orange-red; flesh juicy; yellow, sweet; nutlets 3 to 5, ridged. Dist.: Southwestern Virginia, through west ern North Carolina, eastern Tennessee, northern Georgia, and Alabama; common between 1,500 and 3,000 feet altitude. Strikingly beautiful in late autumn, in its purple foliage and brilliant orange-red fruit dusters.