HARDWOOD RECORD 



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The Famous Rain Tree 



-V conspicuous feature of the tropical American landscape is 

 the ever present samau or rain tree. To travelers in the northern 

 part of South America saman is tlie most familiar name for this 

 tree, and to the general reader it is known chiefly as the Peruvian 

 rain tree. Botanists call it Pithecolobiuni saman. One of its chief 

 characteristics is the extraordinarily large size of its crown, which 

 often covers fully half an acre of ground. Another feature which 

 distinguishes it from practically every one of its associate.s is that 

 it has all its leaves on the small twigs at the extreme ends of the 

 branches. -All the leaves are thus exposed to the direct rays of the 

 sun. 



There is no other tree in tropical America about which there is 

 so much curious information as the saman, and every one who 

 visits the region of its growth alludes to it as one of the most 

 wonderful trees. There is a story about this tree which is familiar 

 to many. It is said that during the day the tree takes up a great 

 deal of water from the earth by means of the roots and that dur- 

 ing the night the water is given off profusely through the leaves 

 in the form of rain. Some of the numerous stories which have been 

 written and published in newspapers about this tree state that 

 travelers in tropical America never pitch their tents under it on 

 account of the jirofusi- dripping of water ti-.-uispired by the leaves 



A number of credulous people who have read such exaggerated 

 statements about its water-transpiring qualities have conceived 

 the idea that the rain tree would be the proper kind to plant in 

 the arid Southwest where droughts are so common. It is true that 

 the rain tree grows in semi-arid condition in Colombia and Peru, 

 but this does not argue that it would grow in New Mexico and 

 Arizona and that it would supply moisture enough to grow crops 

 in the vicinity of such plantations. 



The truth of the matter is that the saman does not transpire 

 any more water than other trees with similar leaf surfaces. It 

 is difficult to say how this legend ever originated. The forest 

 officer of Trinidad, British West Indies, ventured the conjecture 

 tli.'it it may have arisen from the fact that the crown is open 

 and the sun always shines through it to the ground, so that grass 

 and some farm crops will grow underneath a saman almost as 

 freely as in the open. This is a fact which does not obtain in the 

 case of other tropical trees. 



Aside from this legend, the tree is an intensely interesting one 

 from an ornamental point of view. The photograph accompanying 

 these notes shows a fine example of many large saman trees which 

 form landmarks in tropical America. The one here illustrated is 

 standing near the Victoria Institute Building, Port-of -Spain, Trin- 

 idad, and is jpointed out to many thousands of visitors every year. 



SOUTH AMERICAN RAIN TREE 



