Cross Timbers
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The Cross Timbers is a semi-savanna on the southern Great Plains running from southeastern Kansas, across central Oklahoma, into central Texas. It lies at the eastern edge of the great prairies and the western edge of the deciduous forest. The Cross Timbers is mainly post oak (Quercus stellata) and blackjack oak (Quercus marilandica) forests interspersed with patches of open prairie (both tall and mixed grass).
One of the three sub-regions of the North Central Plains of Texas, it is home to Denton, Arlington, and Brownwood. Denton is a widely sought-out place for students because it is home to the University of North Texas and Texas Woman's University. Arlington is a big area in tourism, manufacturing, and recreation activities.
The thick growth formed an almost impenetrable barrier for early American explorers and travelers. Washington Irving, in 1835, described it as "like struggling through forests of cast iron."[1] Josiah Gregg described the Cross Timbers in 1845 as varying in width from five to thirty miles and attributed their denseness to the continual burning of the prairies.[2]
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[edit] Notes
- ^ Irving, A Tour on the Priaries, Ch. 21.
- ^ Gregg, Commerce of the Prairies, V. II, Ch. 10, p. 200: "The Cross Timbers vary in width from five to thirty miles, and entirely cut off the communication betwixt the interior prairies and those of the great plains. They may be considered as the 'fringe' of the great prairies, being a continuous brushy strip, composed of various kinds of undergrowth; such as black-jack, post-oaks, and in some places hickory, elm, etc., intermixed with a very dimunitive dwarf oak, called by the hunters, 'shin-oak.' Most of the timber appears to be kept small by the continual inroads of the 'burning prairies;' for, being killed almost annually, it is constantly replaced by scions of undergrowth; so that it becomes more and more dense every reproduction. In some places, however, the oaks are of considerable size, and able to withstand the conflagrations. The Underwood is so matted in many places with grapevines, green-briars, etc., as to form almost impenetrable 'roughs,' which serve as hiding-places for wild beasts, as well as wild Indians; and would, in savage warfare, prove almost as formidable as the hammocks of Florida".
[edit] Bibliography
- Anderson, Roger C., James S Fralish, Jerry M. Baskin (eds.). Savannas, Barrens, and Rock Outcrop Plant Communities of North America. Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 052157322x
- Francaviglia, Richard V. The Cast Iron Forest: A Natural and Cultural History of the North American Cross Timbers. University of Texas Press, 2000. ISBN 0291725159
- Gregg, Josiah. "The Cross Timbers". Commerce of the Prairies. 1845. V. II, Ch. 10, pp. 199-201. (accessed June 19, 2007: hosted by The Kansas Collection)
- Irving, Washington. "The Dreary Forests of the 'Cross Timber'". A Tour on the Prairies. 1835. Ch. 21. (accessed June 19, 2007: hosted by The Bio Techs Info Centre)
- Johnson, Neil R. (ed. C. Neil Kingsley). The Chickasaw Rancher. University Press of Colorado, 2001. ISBN 978-0-87081-635-2
- McLeran, Vic. The Cooper's Hawk: A Cross Timbers Chronicle. Philadelphia: Xlibris Corporation, 2000. ISBN 0-7388-5935-4 and ISBN 0-7388-5934-6
[edit] Additional reading
- Dale, Edward Everett. The Cross Timbers: Memories of a North Texas Boyhood. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1966. ISBN 0-292-73611-8
- Roach, Joyce. Wild Rose: A Folk History of a Cross Timbers Settlement, Keller, Texas. Denton, TX: University of North Texas Press, 1996. ISBN 0898659728
[edit] External links
- The Ancient Cross Timbers Consortium
- Map of Cross Timbers
- Cross Timbers Historic Images Project–Texas
- The Cross Timbers Resource Book–Oklahoma (link to pdf file)
