The United States boasts twelve types of hickory in ten seperate species. These deciduous trees produce a variety of nutritious nuts wood harder and denser than even hard maple or white oak. Among the nuts produced by the different hickory trees are the pecan and the kingnut. Hickory trees grow to approximately 50 to 100 feet with a spread of aroudn 40 feet.
Morgan's Mechanicals uses sculpted, smooth sanded, and polished hickory wood, along with steel, as parts of its various automatons, especially for sections of outer plating. This gives an artistic look to its models and saves money on steel. The wood is usually stained dark brown. Both shellbark and shagbark hickory wood are used for automatons.
While there are some trees with wood denser than hickory, none have a comparable combination of strength, hardness, stiffness, and shock resistance that hickory does. In addition to being used for automaton plating, it's used for the wheel spokes of carts and carriages, for drumsticks, by Indians and other hunters for bows, for walking sticks, for baseball bats, and in stricter homes and schools for spanking paddles. It's commonly used in wood burning stoves and to cure meats. Hickory is used for fine funiture as well.
The following species are native to America.Carya floridana
As deciduous trees, hickory shed their leaves in the fall and regrow them, as well as their nuts and yellow-green flowers, in the spring.
- Scientific Name
- Conservation Status
- Conservation is not a worry for these species, as they are grown and harvested for their nuts and wood.