Does the county or state offer no charge ID help?
I am new to VA (and East Coast) and my book knowledge is not always reliable in hands on ID. Would like to be able to get definite ID on several plants and trees in general. A more specific concern is how to correctly ID bitter nut hickory w/o having to sample nuts from every hickory tree. I plan to harvest all the bitter nut hickory wood as a part of first phase of thinning my very unhealthy woods.
Mr. Huffman,
Bitternut Hickory will have "naked" (no hard scales), sulfur yellow buds. The bark is also very tight. There are 7 to 11 leaflets, other hckories (except Pecan) have 5 to 9 leaflets.
Sorry, but I can't help with the other understory plants, there are too many!