American Hornbeam (Great Smoky Mountains National Park

American Hornbeam

Carpinus caroliniana

Summary ⁶

Carpinus caroliniana (American hornbeam) is a small hardwood tree in the genus Carpinus. American hornbeam is also known as blue-beech, ironwood, and musclewood. It is native to eastern North America, from Minnesota and southern Ontario east to Maine, and south to eastern Texas and northern Florida. It also grows in Canada (southwest Quebec and southeast Ontario), Mexico (central and southern), Guatemala, and western Honduras.

Taxon biology ⁷

Betulaceae -- Birch family

F. T. Metzger

American hornbeam (Carpinus caroliniana), also called blue-beech, ironwood, water-beech, or lechillo (Spanish), is a small slow-growing short-lived tree in the understory of eastern mixed hardwood forests. The short, often crooked trunk covered with a smooth slate gray bark is characteristically ridged, resembling the muscles of a flexed arm. The wood is close-grained, very hard, and heavy but little used because such a small tree is rarely converted into sawed products.