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Plant Identification Guide
Beaked hazelnut Corylus cornuta
Also Known As: Filbert
Plant Family: Birch (Betulaceae)
Did you know? As the common name suggests, the husk (involucral tube)
surrounding the nut extends beyond the nut by at least one inch to form a
beak. Nuts ripen in late August and September and are edible, though most
commercially-available hazelnuts come from hybrid plants. Deer, moose, elk,
and even snowshoe hare are known to browse on Beaked hazelnut twigs
throughout the winter months. Bears, wild turkeys, other birds and rodents
often eat the nuts.
Identification Hints
Beaked hazelnuts are medium to tall
shrubs with an interesting fruit that
sets them apart from other shrubs.
The “beaked husk” around the nut
is unique to this species and makes
it easy to identify among other
hazelnuts in the United States. In
Great Lakes states, beaked hazelnut
is often found as a dominant
understory shrub in aspen, jack pine,
or red pine forest stands.
Plant Description
The beaked hazelnut is a multistemmed perennial, deciduous shrub
or small tree that can grow 3 to 19 ft
(1 to 6 m) in height. It is often densely
clonal in nature and each shrub
generally has multiple stems. The
nuts are an important food source for
birds and small mammals. Jays, red
squirrels, and least chipmunks are
major dispersers of Beaked hazelnuts,
caching the seeds and helping them
to germinate.
Leaves: Alternate leaf arrangement
with hairy, leathery, oval-shaped
leaves generally 0.16 to 0.39 in (4 to
10 mm) long. The leaf edges are doubly
toothed (serrate), giving them a bit of
a jagged edge appearance. The leaves
typically appear and expand between
April and May and fall from the tree in
September and October.
Bark: The bark is smooth or scaly and
dark brown. The twigs can be hairless or
have a few hairs (the hairs are sometimes
glandular (sticky), so if you look at them
with a magnifying glass they might have
little blobs (glands) at the tips).
Flowers: Beaked hazelnut has separate
male (staminate) and female (pistillate)
flowers. Tiny staminate flowers are
arranged spirally in long, yellowish
pencil-like structures called catkins, that
hang from the twigs; pistillate flowers
are enclosed in bracts (modified leaves)
at the tips of twigs (appear as terminal
buds) with red, showy tentacle-like
projections (the stigmas) visible. The
flowers appear in the early spring, up to
2 weeks before the leaves, and are wind
pollinated. The pollen is often released
from the flowers sometime in April.
Habitat: Full sun to part shade in
organically rich, medium moisture but welldrained soils. Associated with forest edges
and openings, thickets, and rocky slopes at
low to middle elevations.
Fruits: The fruit is an acorn-like nut,
0.79 in (2 cm) in diameter, surrounded
by a husk (involucral tube) which
extends beyond the nut by at least one
inch to form a beak. The number of nuts
produced varies from year to year in a
stand, with large crops about every 2-3
years. The nuts ripen in late August and
September and often fall from the tree
once ripe.
Bloom time: Early spring.
Compiled by: Sandra Henderson and Paul Alaback
Sources: USDA - NRCS PLANTS Database; The
Jepson manual: higher plants of California. University
of California Press; Flora of North America Editorial
Committee; Missouri Botanical Garden; US Forest
Service (http://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/
shrub/corcor/all.html) Photo courtesy of Oregon State
University Landscape Plants
budburst.org
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