Carpinus caroliniana aka Ironwood

Carpinus caroliniana, commonly known as American hornbeam, is a slow-growing, small to medium-sized deciduous tree with an attractive globular form. It is native to eastern North America, from Minnesota and southern Ontario east to Maine, and south to eastern Texas and northern Florida, as well as in Canada (southwest Quebec and southeast Ontario). The tree is also known as blue-beech, ironwood, musclewood, and muscle beech. American hornbeam is typically found in areas with moist soil, including streambanks, riverbanks, valleys, ravine bottoms, and rocky slopes along streams throughout the eastern and Ozark regions of the state. The tree grows up to 30 feet tall and has leaves that alternate with a doubly toothed margin. Its smooth, gray to bluish-gray bark and larger branches exhibit a distinctive muscle-like fluting that has given rise to the common name musclewood. In the spring, the tree produces separate male and female catkins, with the female catkins giving way to distinctive clusters of winged nutlets. The leaves are dark green, serrated, elliptic-oval, and often produce respectable shades of yellow, orange, and red in the fall. The extremely hard wood of this tree will take a horn-like polish and was used by early Americans to make bowls, tool handles, and ox yokes, but commercial use of hornbeam wood is not practical due to the limited amount of wood per tree. The genus name, Carpinus, comes from the classical Latin name, while the specific epithet, caroliniana, means of North or South Carolina.