SALICACE^ 



181 



about y long; stipules reniform, conspicuously veiued, about ^^' broad, usually 

 persistent during the season. Flowers: aments densely flowered, oblong, cylindrical, 

 erect, often more or less curved, about 1^' long, terminal on short branches ; their 

 scales oblong-obovate, acute, dark-colored, glabrous except at the base, persistent 

 under the fruit; stamens 2, with elongated free glabrous filaments; ovary cylindri- 

 cal, long-stalked, elongated, gradually narrowed into a slender style, with spreading 

 emarginate stigmas. Fruit elongated, light brown slightly tinged with red, about 

 i' long. 



A small tree, with a slender trunk and upright branches forming a narrow shapely 

 head, and slender branchlets marked with scattered lenticels, glabrous or slightly 

 puberulous and often tinged with red at first, soon becoming yellow and lustrous, 

 growing lighter colored in tlieir second year. Winter-buds ovate, rounded on the 

 back, compressed and acute at the apex, bright orange color, about 1' long. 



Distribution. Shores of Great Slave Lake southward through the region at 

 the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains to northern Idaho, and to Lake County, 

 California, and now regarded as a western form of the shrubby Salix cordata, Muehl., 

 one of the commonest and most variable of American Willows, ranging from the 

 Arctic Circle to the northern United States, and from the shores of the Atlantic 

 Ocean to British Columbia and California. 



14. Salix Missouriensis, Bebb. Willow. 



Leaves involute in the bud, lanceolate or oblanceolate, gradually narrowed from 

 above the middle to the wedge-shaped or rounded base, acuminate and long-pointed 

 at the apex, finely serrate, with glandular teeth, coated with pale hairs on the lower 



surface and pilose on the upper surface when they unfold, soon becoming nearly gla- 

 brous, at maturity thin and firm, dark green above, pale and often glaucous below, 

 4'-6' long, I'-iy wide, with slender veins often united near the margins and connected 

 by reticulate coarse veinlets; their petioles stout, pubescent, or tomentose, ^' I'long; 

 stipules foliaceous, semicordate, pointed or rarely reniform and obtuse, serrate, with 

 incurved teeth, dark green and glabrous on the upper side, coated on the lower 

 with hoary tomentum, reticulate-venulose, often ^' long, deciduous or persistent 

 during the season. Flowers: aments oblong-cylindrical, erect, densely flowered. 



