Eladjit oak

The Eladjit oak is a medium sized oak commonly found in central Ruleska, from eastern Kalentoi lands through Eladjit and Irzal. It typically grows in mountainous country, cloaking the hillsides with its spreading branches and leathery foliage. The leaves are roughly obovate, tapering towards the stem, with sinuate margins. Both the young twigs and the undersides of the leaves are covered in dense grey hairs, giving the tree its other name of woolly oak. While it can grow nearly 100 feet tall, it is more commonly about half that height. Branches begin low down on the trunk, often giving even larger trees a somewhat shrubby look.

Uses

Eladjit oak offers similar utilitarian value to other oak species, being useful for the construction of buildings, furniture, and various kinds of containers. It is very resistant to mildew and so is often used in damp climates or where it might be expected get wet. Bridges, road planking, barrels, and buckets all benefit from this useful property of the tree. It is also frequently used to create the necks of kemenche fiddles and the bows used to play them.

Eladjit oaks are good produces of acorns, but their high tannin content makes it difficult to create palatable flour from them. However, the Eladjit people are known to bake small cakes from this flour and present them as traditional offerings to the simurgh as part of some of their traditional festivals, which is doubtless why the tree is also known as the simurgh oak only within that country.