Deceptive leatherwood

Images

Click on image to view full size

Deceptive leatherwood leaves

Deceptive leatherwood flowers

Deceptive leatherwood buds

Deceptive leatherwood habit

Deceptive leatherwood bark

Deceptive leatherwood

Deceptive leatherwood fruit

Morphology

Trunk

Stems erect; bark gray to tan, smooth; wood white, soft.

Twigs

Yellowish brown, flexible, appressed-pubescent; leaf scars crescent-shaped; pith white; buds hidden in hollow petiole bases, brown, ovoid, .04 to .08 inch, apex obtuse, scales densely silky.

Leaves

Deciduous, alternate, simple; petiole .04 to .16 inch, densely appressed-pubescent; blade obovate to elliptic or oblong, 73 to 3.6 inches long, 1.8 to 2.4 inches wide, base rounded, margins entire, ciliate, apex rounded, lower surfaces green to light green, silky, upper surfaces green, sparsely silky along midvein.

Flowers

Inflorescences axillary on new growth, fascicles, (2-)3(-6)-flowered; bracts 4, outer 2 dropping off early, inner 2 persistent, leaf-like, oblong-obovate, .24 to .6 inch, elongating to 1.6 inches in fruit, abaxially densely silky; pedicels 0–1 mm. Flowers bisexual, radially symmetric, nodding; sepals 4, connate proximally, calyx tube green to yellowish green, tubular to funnelform, .16 to .3 inch, lobes triangular, .12 to .16 inch; petals absent or represented by minute scales; stamens 8, adnate to calyx tube throat, exserted; pistil 1, 1-locular; ovary superior; style 1, slightly exserted.

Fruit

June-July; drupes, green, often turning yellow distally, ovoid to pyriform, .3 to .43 inch long, .16 to .2 inch wide, sparsely hairy at apex; stone 1, brown, sometimes mottled, ovoid, .28 to .4 inch long, .12 to .18 inch wide, longitudinally grooved on 1 side.

Ecology

Habitat

Bases of limestone bluffs, stream banks.

Distribution

Johnson County, Kansas

Additional Notes