Carpinus laxiflora

Description

Hornbeams are hardwood trees in the flowering plant genus Carpinus in the birch family Betulaceae. The 30–40 species occur across much of the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. The common English name hornbeam derives from the hardness of the woods (likened to horn) and the Old English beam "tree" (cognate with Dutch ‘’Boom’’ and German Baum). The American hornbeam is also occasionally known as blue-beech, ironwood, or musclewood, the first from the resemblance of the bark to that of the American beech Fagus grandifolia, the other two from the hardness of the wood and the muscled appearance of the trunk and limbs. The botanic name for the genus, Carpinus, is the original Latin name for the European species. Formerly some taxonomists segregated them with the genera Corylus (hazels) and Ostrya (hop-hornbeams) in a separate family, Corylaceae. However, modern botanists place Carpinus in the birch subfamily Coryloideae. Species of Carpinus are often grouped into two subgenera Carpinus subgenus Carpinus and Carpinus subgenus Distegicarpus. However, phylogentic analysis has shown that Ostrya likely evolved from a Carpinus ancestor somewhere in C. subg. Distegicarpus making Carpinus paraphyletic. The fossil record of the genus extends back to the Early Eocene, Ypresian of northwestern North America, with the species Carpinus perryae described from fossil fruits found in the Klondike Mountain Formation of Republic, Washington.