Tree up to about 25 m tall. Branchlets with paired thorns. Leaves pinnate with an odd terminal leaflet; leaflets ovate, rounded at apex, 2.5-5 cm long. Flowers white, in pendulous racemes.
A native of the United States, from Pennsylvania to Georgia and as far west as Iowa and Oklahoma It appears to be a species which needs an appreciable amount of winter rainfall or snowfall to grow well; it has been successfully planted in Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh in the northwest Himalaya, but further east results are much poorer.
There are from 35,000 to 80,000 seeds kg-1. The seed can be stored for ten years or more; it should be treated with hot water before it is sown.
The seeds can be sown directly into polypots, and will need 4-9 months in the nursery before it is planted out.
In
Nepal it was fairly widely planted about 1983, but with poor results; survival in
Community Forestry Project plantations in 1983 was less than ten per cent
(Community Forestry Development Project, 1984). It failed in trial plots at
Syangja, Tistung and Kharidhunga. Any future plantings of this species should
be restricted to small-scale trial plots, to be observed for three or four years,
before any more large-scale plantations are attempted.