ARBORICULTURE 



225 



The Dwarf Oak of the Rocky Mountains. 



Qucrcns reticulata and Q. undulata, with 

 0. Arizonica Farther South. 



The oak family is represented in Col- 

 orado and Rocky Mountain region by two 

 varieties, which are ordinarily but low 

 growing shrubs. The\- are found in the 

 lower altitudes, 5,000 to 7,000 feet, cover- 

 ing many slopes. Seldom do either var- 

 iety attain a diameter to exceed four 

 inches and a height of five to fifteen 

 feet, but occasionally, when isolated, and 

 in favorable locality, they attain a diam- 

 eter of twenty-four inches and height of 

 forty feet. 



These oaks are propagated from acorns 

 and also from underground root stems — 

 a clump covering four hundred square 

 feet and comprising fifty stems are all 

 connected by the same root system. This 

 is at variance with the oak family regula- 

 tions, as known elsewhere. We present 

 two views of these trees, one which we 

 photographed on the Divide near Palmer 

 Lake, being 18 inches in diameter ; the 

 other view is a representative group, 

 taken near Colorado Springs. 



The acorns are small and form the 

 principal food, in autumn, of the numer- 

 ous small animals and birds, and, as 

 provided by nature these animals and 

 fowls become the great tree planters and 

 protectors, dropping an acorn here and 

 there, accidentally, however, which pro- 

 duce new clumps of oak to supply future 

 birds with necessary food, and by de- 

 stroying noxious insects, the birds also 

 preserve the oaks from their depreda- 

 tions. 



It would be a tedious process to cut 

 cordwood from these small oaks ; thev 

 are not. suited for milling purposes ; and 

 thus to the fuel gatherer and lumberman 

 these bushes are of no appreciable value 

 for money making. 



Nature, however, has many and varied 

 methods of planting forests and covering 

 the bare spots of the earth with verdure. 



These insignificant dwarf oaks are of 

 vast importance in this great scheme of 

 nature. Where the lumberman is tearing 

 down and destroving the trees, nature is 



creating new forests and takes advantage 

 of the oak — the birds and the squirrels 

 to aid her. 



These deciduous plants accumulate leaf 

 mold about the base of their stems, soil 

 is formed and held in place, snow is re- 

 tained to moisten the soil, the seeds of 

 pine, spruce and fir, dropping in the 

 clump of bushes, take root, are protected 

 from stock and from the scorching sun, 

 and in a few years become great trees. 

 Other seeds in great numbers fall to the 

 ground, "some on stony ground," many 

 on exposed spots where the sun quickly 

 destroys them and where stock trample 

 and browse them — few succeed without 

 the protection of some friendly shrub or 

 herb growth. 



Upon a dry rocky mountain in New 

 Mexico I found many spruce trees grow- 

 ing among the dwarf oak clumps, but 

 not one elsewhere ; goats and donkeys 

 have browsed the oaks and destroyed all 

 coniferous growths, but such as were 

 within the dense clump where animals 

 could not reach them. Thinned to one 

 stem, all suckers removed, the'se oaks 

 grow more thriftily, and. in good soil, 

 well protected, make handsome trees 

 thirty feet in height. 



On the mountains, late frosts fre- 

 quently destroy the early growths, and 

 new shoots and leaves must be provided 

 from the older wood ; hence the bushes 

 are dwarfed and by a succession of an- 

 nual frosts, the trees have had their na- 

 ture changed to the habit of bushes. 



On the mesas browsing by animals 

 keep them to a height of but two or three 

 feet, yet so strong is the vigor of the 

 root system that they survive such treat- 

 ment where other plants would quickly 

 succumb. 



The attention of forest planters and the 

 government is called to these facts, and 

 to this plant, together with the yucca, 

 and similar hardy, arid region growths, 

 as a means of afforesting large tracts in 

 the western plain country, with the aid 

 of such shrubs as nurses, to shade the 

 young trees, and prepare for them a fer- 



