Flowering and fruiting. The small, greenish, monoecious flowers bloom in March to May.
The pistillate flowers are borne in axillary, globose heads that form the 22- to 35-mm-diameter
multiple heads of small 2-celled capsules (figure 1). The lustrous green color of the fruiting headfades to yellowish green or yellow as maturity is reached in September to November (Bonner 1974;Vines 1960). At the point of color change, moisture content of the fruit head should have droppedbelow 70% (Bonner 1972).

The beaklike capsules

The beaklike capsules open at this time, and the small, winged seeds (figures 2 and 3), 1 or 2 per capsule, are dispersed. Empty fruiting heads often remain on the trees over winter. Fair seed crops occur every year and bumper crops about every 3 years. The flowers are susceptible to late spring freezes that can greatly reduce seed crops. Crop reductions of up to 44% have also been reported from damage by seed bugsCLeptoglossus oppositus SayCin North Carolina (Ebel and Summerville 1983). Some trees have been known to flower and bear fruit 4 and 5 years after planting (Mohn and Randall 1970), but good crops are not common until the tress reach 20 to 30 years of age (Bonner 1974).