''Aesculus glabra'', commonly known as Ohio buckeye,''Aesculus glabra''
Missouri Botanical Garden is a species of tree in the soapberry family (

Sapindaceae The Sapindaceae are a family of flowering plants in the order Sapindales known as the soapberry family. It contains 138 genera and 1858 accepted species. Examples include horse chestnut, maples, ackee and lychee. The Sapindaceae occur in tempera ...

) native to North America. Its natural range is primarily in the

Midwestern The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of the United States. I ...

and lower

Great Plains The Great Plains (french: Grandes Plaines), sometimes simply "the Plains", is a broad expanse of flatland in North America. It is located west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains, much of it covered in prairie, steppe, an ...

regions of the United States, extending southeast into the geological Black Belt of Alabama and Mississippi. It is also found locally in the extreme southwest of

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

, on

Walpole Island Walpole Island is an island and First Nation reserve in southwestern Ontario, Canada, on the border between Ontario and Michigan in the United States. It is located in the mouth of the St. Clair River on Lake St. Clair, about by road from Winds ...

Lake St. Clair Lake St. Clair (french: Lac Sainte-Claire) is a freshwater lake that lies between the Canadian province of Ontario and the U.S. state of Michigan. It was named in 1679 by French Catholic explorers after Saint Clare of Assisi, on whose feast day ...

. It is found in a variety of natural habitats, including streambanks, upland

mesic forest In ecology, a mesic habitat is a type of habitat with a moderate or well-balanced supply of moisture, e.g., a mesic forest, a temperate hardwood forest, or dry-mesic prairie. Mesic habitats transition to xeric shrublands in a non-linear fashion, ...

s, and along the margins of old fields. It is typically found in

calcareous Calcareous () is an adjective meaning "mostly or partly composed of calcium carbonate", in other words, containing lime or being chalky. The term is used in a wide variety of scientific disciplines. In zoology ''Calcareous'' is used as an adje ...

areas.

Description

The

leaves A leaf (plural, : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant plant stem, stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", wh ...

are palmately compound with five long and broad. The

flower A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants (plants of the division Angiospermae). The biological function of a flower is to facilitate reproduction, usually by providing a mechani ...

s are produced in

panicle A panicle is a much-branched inflorescence. (softcover ). Some authors distinguish it from a compound spike inflorescence, by requiring that the flowers (and fruit) be pedicellate (having a single stem per flower). The branches of a panicle are of ...

s in spring, red, yellow to yellow-green, each flower long with the stamens longer than the petals (unlike the related

yellow buckeye ''Aesculus flava'', the yellow buckeye, common buckeye, or sweet buckeye, is a species of deciduous tree. It is native to the Ohio Valley and Appalachian Mountains of the Eastern United States. It grows in mesophytic forest or floodplains, genera ...

, where the stamens are shorter than the petals). The

fruit In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants that is formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which flowering plants (also known as angiosperms) disseminate their seeds. Edible fruits in particu ...

is a round capsule diameter, containing one

nut Nut often refers to: * Nut (fruit), fruit composed of a hard shell and a seed, or a collective noun for dry and edible fruits or seeds * Nut (hardware), fastener used with a bolt Nut or Nuts may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Co ...

-like

seed A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiospe ...

, in diameter, brown with a whitish basal scar. The inedible seeds contain

tannic acid Tannic acid is a specific form of tannin, a type of polyphenol. Its weak acidity ( pKa around 6) is due to the numerous phenol groups in the structure. The chemical formula for commercial tannic acid is often given as C76H52O46, which correspon ...

and are poisonous to both

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult mal ...

and humans. The young foliage, shoots, and bark are also poisonous to some degree.Ohio Buckeye, in Silvics Manual Volume 2: Hardwoods
USDA Forest Service However, Native Americans reportedly did eat buckeye fruit after boiling it to extract tannin.

Uses

''Aesculus glabra'' has little use as a timber tree due to its soft, light wood. Although occasionally seen in cultivation, the large, copiously produced fruits make it generally undesirable as a street tree.

Native American ethnobotany

The

Lenape The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory includ ...

carry the nuts in their pockets for

rheumatism Rheumatism or rheumatic disorders are conditions causing chronic, often intermittent pain affecting the joints or connective tissue. Rheumatism does not designate any specific disorder, but covers at least 200 different conditions, including art ...

, and an infusion of ground nuts is mixed with sweet oil or mutton tallow for earaches. They also grind the nuts and use them to poison fish in streams. Native Americans blanched buckeye nuts, extracting the tannic acid for use in making leather. The nuts can also be dried, turning dark as they harden with exposure to the air, and strung into necklaces similar to those made from the

kukui nut ''Aleurites moluccanus'', the candlenut, is a flowering tree in the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, also known as candleberry, Indian walnut, ''kemiri'', varnish tree, ''nuez de la India'', ''buah keras'', ''godou'', kukui nut tree, and ''rata ke ...

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

Culture

The Ohio buckeye is the state tree of

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, and its name is an original term of endearment for the pioneers on the Ohio frontier. Subsequently, "buckeye" came to be used as the nickname and colloquial name for people from Ohio.

The Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publi ...

adopted "Buckeyes" officially as its nickname in 1950, and also uses the name for its sports teams. It came to be applied to any student or graduate of the university.

Buckeye candy Buckeyes are a confection made from a peanut butter fudge partially dipped in chocolate to leave a circle of peanut butter visible. Buckeyes are similar to peanut butter balls (or peanut-butter-filled chocolate balls), which are completely cove ...

, made to resemble the tree's nut, is made by dipping a ball of

peanut butter Peanut butter is a food paste or spread made from ground, dry-roasted peanuts. It commonly contains additional ingredients that modify the taste or texture, such as salt, sweeteners, or emulsifiers. Peanut butter is consumed in many countri ...

fudge in

milk chocolate Milk chocolate is a solid chocolate confectionery containing cocoa, sugar and milk. Chocolate was originally sold and consumed as a beverage in pre-Columbian times, and upon its introduction to Western Europe. Major milk chocolate producers incl ...

, leaving a circle of the peanut butter exposed. These are a popular treat in Ohio, especially during the

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating Nativity of Jesus, the birth of Jesus, Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people Observance of Christmas by country, around t ...

and

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

seasons. Buckeyes (the nuts) are a recurring theme in

Bill Watterson William Boyd Watterson II (born July 5, 1958) is a retired American cartoonist and the author of the comic strip ''Calvin and Hobbes'', which was syndicated from 1985 to 1995. Watterson stopped drawing ''Calvin and Hobbes'' at the end of 1995, ...

's comic, ''

Calvin and Hobbes ''Calvin and Hobbes'' is a daily American comic strip created by cartoonist Bill Watterson that was syndicated from November 18, 1985, to December 31, 1995. Commonly cited as "the last great newspaper comic", ''Calvin and Hobbes'' has enjoyed ...

'', often as one of Calvin's tools of torment. Watterson himself grew up in

Chagrin Falls Chagrin Falls is a village in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States and is a suburb of Cleveland in Northeast Ohio's Cleveland-Akron-Canton metropolitan area, the 19th-largest Combined Statistical Area nationwide. The village was established and h ...

, Ohio.

References

External links