See description for Quercus ×hispanica ' Lucombeana'
Source: (1997). Fagaceae. In: . Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 2. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 1. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.
Quercus ×hispanica 'Lucombeana'
A hybrid between Q. cerris and Q. suber; these species hybridise readily with variable progeny that is best referred to Q. ×hispanica, Spanish Oak. Small evergreen or semi-deciduous tree mostly 6-8 m tall but may be much taller. Bark blackish, trunk often gnarled and buttressed at the base. Buds with thread-like stipules. Young shoots downy. Leaves more or less oval, mostly 5-10 cm long, 2.5-5 cm wide, unequal at the base with (5-)6-7 (-9) pairs of veins terminating in sharply pointed teeth, glossy above, grey felty below. Leaf stalk to 1.5 cm long. Acorns in 1s and 2s on short, thick stalks, maturing in 2 years, to 2.5 cm long, half enclosed in a cup with downy scales that are bent back at the base of the cup. [Q. lucombeana Sweet]
Garden origin
Bean (1976) records that this tree was discovered c. 1763 by nurseryman Lucombe of Exeter, England. Lucombe felled the original tree to make boards for his coffin and stored them under his bed. The boards remained under his bed until he died at the age of 102.
Rough, gnarled, corky bark; leaves unequal at the base. The leaves are most similar to the parent Q. cerris but generally more shallowly toothed, less jagged, and more dark hairy below; not totally deciduous.
NSW: Armidale (Central Park, several large trees); Mt Wilson ('Yengo' planted c. 1877). VIC: Melbourne (Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria (Melbourne Gardens), Oak Lawn, a herbarium specimen of this tree was collected in 1930; Government House drive).
