318 Junior Naturalist Monthly. 



general appearance. Notice whether the trees are tall, whether the 

 branches are spreading, whether the leaves are long or short, and 

 whether the cones are large or small. After you have looked at the 

 trees a little while, carefully take a branch from each of the different 

 kinds. These you can study in the school-room where it is nice and 

 warm, and find out some things that you cannot learn by looking 

 at the trees. In Fig. 9 you will see are illustrations of four different 

 kinds of evergreen boughs: the white pine; the pitch pine; the Nor- 

 way spruce; the hemlock. Let us look at them carefully and com- 

 pare them with the boughs we have brought in from the woods. 



THE WHITE PINE. 



1. What is the color of the bark on your white pine branch? 



2. How long are the leaves? 



3. Notice whether there is a little sheath at the base of each bundle that binds 

 :t together. 



4. How many buds do you find on the branch? 



5. Where are they situated? 



6. Notice the cones; are they long or short? 



7. On what part of the branch do you find them? 



8. Are the scales of the cones opened or closed? 



9. Do you find scales inside the cones? If so, describe them. 



THE PITCH PINE. 



1. Compare the bark on your branch of pitch pine with that on the white pine. 

 How does it differ? 



2. Notice how rigid are the leaves of the pitch pine and how straight they stand 

 out from the branches. 



3. Notice whether there is a sheath which binds the leaves together at the base. 



4. How do the cones of the pitch pine compare in size with those of the white 

 pine? 



5. It takes the pitch pine three years to ripen its seeds. You will find in Fig. 7 

 near the end of the branch very tiny cones that have growTa since spring. Farther 

 along on the branch are the cones that are two years old. Notice how tightly 

 closed they are. Then near the base of the branch there is a cone three years old. 

 It has opened and scattered its seeds. 



THE NORWAY SPRUCE. 



1. In the spruce you will notice that the leaves are not arranged in clusters. 



2. Find out whether there is a sheath at the base of the leaves. 



3. Take out a leaf and tell us whether you find any stem on it. 



4. Are the leaves stiff or soft and feathery? 



5. As I look at a branch of Norway spruce, it seems as if the leaves were all on 

 the upper side of the branch; is this so? 



