Cross Timbers was the name applied to a section of wooded lands, beginning at about the 99th degree of longitude, in latitude 36° 30 north, and extending southward from the Arkansas river in Oklahoma to the Brazos river in Texas. In extent they were from 5 to 30 miles in width from east to west and about 400 miles long from north to south. According to Dr. Josiah Gregg, these lands "entirely cut off the communication betwixt the interior prairies and those of the great plains."

Gregg says further: "They may be considered as the 'fringe' of the great prairies, being a continuous brushy strip, composed of various kinds of undergrowth, such as black-jacks, post-oaks, and in some places hickory, elm, etc., intermixed with a very diminutive dwarf oak, called by the hunters 'shin-oak.' Most of the timber appears to be kept small by the continual inroads of the 'burning-prairies;' for being killed almost annually, it is constantly replaced by scions of undergrowth; so that it becomes more and more dense every reproduction. In some places the oaks are of considerable size, and able to withstand the conflagrations. The underwood is so matted in many places with grape vines, green brairs, etc., as to form almost impenetrable 'roughs,' which serve as hiding places for wild beasts, as well as wild Indians; and would, in savage warfare, prove almost as formidable as the hummocks of Florida. South of the Canadian, a branch of these Cross Timbers projects off westward, extending across this stream, and up its course for 100 miles or so, from whence it inclines northwest beyond the North Fork, and ultimately ceases, no doubt, in the great sandy plains in that direction. The region of the Cross Timbers is generally well watered; and is interspersed with romantic and fertile tracts . . . . Among the Cross Timbers the black bear is very common, living chiefly upon acorns and other fruits. . . . That species of gazelle known as the antelope is very numerous upon the high plains . . . . About the Cross Timbers . . are quantities of wild turkeys. That species of American grouse, known west as the prairie hen, is very abundant on the frontier, and is quite destructive, in autumn, to the prairie cornfields. Partridges are found about as far west; but their number is quite limited beyond the precincts of the settlements." (Gregg's Commerce of the Prairies.)