About Carya carolinae-septentrionalis (Ashe) Engl. & Graebn.
Carya carolinae-septentrionalis, commonly called Carolina shagbark hickory, is a large deciduous tree. It grows to well over 100 feet (30 m) tall, and can live for more than 350 years. The tallest recorded shagbark hickory measured over 150 feet (46 m) tall, and grows in Savage Gulf, Tennessee. Mature shagbark hickories are easy to identify by their characteristic shaggy bark, which gives the species its common name; this shaggy trait only appears on mature trees, while young trees have smooth bark. Leaves are 30–60 cm (12–24 in) long, and are pinnate with five leaflets (rarely three or seven). The terminal three leaflets are much larger than the basal pair. This species is monoecious: staminate flowers grow on long-stalked catkins at the tip of old wood, or in the axils of leaves from the previous growing season, while pistillate flowers grow in short terminal spikes. Its fruit is a 2.5 to 4 cm (1 to 1 ½ in) long drupe, containing an edible nut with a hard, bony shell. The nut is encased in a thick, green, four-sectioned husk that turns dark and splits away when the fruit matures in the fall. The terminal buds of shagbark hickory are large and covered with loose scales. Trees begin producing seeds at around 10 years of age, but do not produce large seed crops until they reach 40 years old, and can continue producing seeds for at least 100 years. Nut production is erratic: good crops occur every 3 to 5 years, with few or no nuts produced between good crops, and entire crops may be lost to animal predation. Shagbark hickory is native across most of the eastern United States, but it is largely absent from the southeastern and Gulf Coastal Plains, as well as the lower Mississippi Delta. An isolated population grows in eastern Canada as far north as Lavant Township, in Canadian growing zone 4b. Scattered individual shagbark hickories also grow in the Sierra Madre Oriental of eastern Mexico. The species was introduced to Europe in the 17th century, and still occurs as a non-native species in Central Europe. Its native range is one of the widest of any hickory species, though it is less common now due to selective harvesting for its wood. A wide range of wild animals eat shagbark hickory nuts, including red squirrels, gray squirrels, raccoons, chipmunks, mice, black bears, gray foxes, red foxes, rabbits, and bird species such as mallards, wood ducks, bobwhites, and wild turkey. Shagbark hickory nuts are edible and have an excellent flavor. They are not suited to commercial or orchard production, because trees take a long time to produce sizable crops and output varies unpredictably from year to year. The nuts can be used as a substitute for pecans in colder climates, and fill nearly the same culinary role. The tree's bark is also used to add flavor to maple-style syrup. Shagbark hickory nuts were an important staple food in indigenous diets. Excavations of an ancient site dated to approximately 4350–4050 calibrated years before present at Victor Mills in Columbia County, Georgia found hickory nuts, processing tools, and other artifacts that show large-scale processing and storage of these nuts. Native Americans used nut kernel milk to make corn cakes, kanuchi, and hominy, and the nuts were a significant food source for the Algonquins. Shagbark hickory wood is used for smoking meat, and was used to make bows by Native Americans in northern North America. Air-dried shagbark hickory lumber weighs 63 pounds per cubic foot; it is heavy, hard, and tough, so it has been used to make implements and tools that require strength, including axles, axe handles, ploughs, skis, and drum sticks.
