HEATH FAMILY 27 



eels nearly as long, bearing 4 to 6 bractlets; calyx hairy, its lobes ovate, very acute, 

 longer than the tube; corolla campanulate, shallowly lobed, II/2 to 2 times as long 

 as the calyx; anthers not awned. 



Wet or boggy spots on wooded slopes, along small streams, or in canons, 3000 

 to 4800 feet : North Coast Ranges from Humboldt Co. to Siskiyou and Del Norte 

 Cos. ; Sierra Nevada in Eldorado Co. North to British Columbia and Idaho. June. 



Locs. — North Coast Ranges: Horse Mt., Humboldt Co., Tracy 7670; Camp Sis, Smitli River, 

 If. S. Baker 245 ; Onion Patch on Kelsey Trail, w. Siskiyou Mts., Jepson 2878 ; Camp Six, Del 

 Norte Co., B. Van Deventer 158; Sisson, Lemmon. Eldorado Co.: Blodgett Forest, 14 mi. e. of 

 Georgetown, P. S. Haddoch. 



Refs. — Gatiltheria ovatifolia Gray, Proc. Am. Acad. 19:85 (1883), type loc. Cascade Mts., 

 Lyall; Piper, Contrib. U. S. Nat. Herb. 11:441 (1906) ; Abrams, Madrono 2:122 (1934). 



9. ARBUTUS L. Akbute Tree 



Evergreen trees or shi-ubs with glossy leathery alternate leaves. Flowers in a 

 terminal panicle of dense racemes. Calyx small, S-joarted. Corolla globular or 

 ovate, 5-lobed at apex. Stamens twice as many as the corolla-lobes, included; fila- 

 ments soft-hairy; anthers with a pair of refiexed awns on the back. Ovary on a 

 hypogynous disk, 5 or rarely 4-celled. Fruit a many-seeded berry with granular 

 surface. — Species about 14, North America, Europe and Asia. (Latin name of the 

 Arbute tree under which, says Horace, idle men delight to lie. ) 



1. A. menziesii Pursh. Madrono. (Fig. 289.) Widely branching tree 20 to 

 125 feet high; bark polished, crimson or terra-cotta, or on old trunks dark brown 

 and fissured into small scales; leaf -blades narrowly elliptic or ovatish, glabrous, 

 dark green and polished above, glaucous beneath, entire, or on vigorous shoots finely 

 serrate, 3 to 6 inches long; petioles i/o to 1 inch long; flowei"s white; corolla 3 lines 

 long, with 5 very small lobes recurving from the small opening, and 10 semitrans- 

 parent glands in a circle at base; berry somewhat depressed-globose, 4 to 5 lines in 

 diameter, fleshj' but rather dry, red or orange color. 



Rich slopes and ridges in the foothills and mountains, 300 to 4000 feet : Lower 

 California (rare) ; coastal Southern California (the stations few and scattered) ; 

 Coast Ranges from San Luis Obispo Co. to Del Norte Co. ; Sierra Nevada from Mari- 

 posa Co. to Shasta Co. North to British Columbia. Apr. -May. 



Field note. — In Southern California, in the South Coast Ranges outside of the Redwood belt, 

 and in the inner North Coast Range Arbutus menziesii is an uncommon or rare tree, as also gen- 

 erally in the Sierra Nevada. In the Redwood belt, associated with Sequoia sempervirens, it is 

 abundant. It is even more abundant in the Redwood border forest composed of Quercus garryana, 

 Pseudotsuga taxifolia and Lithocarpus densiflora (Pasania densiflora). With the two latter spe- 

 cies it is commonly in active competition, but is always pushed to one side in the struggle for light, 

 so that Madrono trees are slender and the trunks nearly always curving or contorted, the crown 

 eventually occupying but a very small area in the forest canopy. Long curving forms of trunks 

 30 to 60 feet long are no uncommon spectacle in the forest. On account of this leaning character 

 the diameter of the trunk is always greater in one direction, and in extreme cases the trunk is 

 much flattened. The base of the trunk, too, is often strongly buttressed or tends to develop a 

 broad tabulation at the ground. Since the Madrono suffers severely from forest fires, a tree with 

 a hollowed trunk finally falls, regeneration shoots develop from the expanded base and eventually 

 a circle of trees surrounds the old site. Many such circles diversify the Mendocino and Humboldt 

 woods. A circle of this kind may be destroyed by fire, whereupon a second circle arises more or 

 less outside the first circle. Evidence of regeneration after fire is everywhere apparent throughout 

 the range of the species in California. F. W. Peirson, a field student in Southern California, 

 writes: "The marked belt of Arbutus menziesii across the south slope of the San Gabriel Range 

 is second growth; at some time in the past it must have formed a splendid strip of forest; the 

 bases or relic butts of the former trees are everywhere apparent. Choosing the largest butt that 

 could be found, it measured eight feet in diameter." 



The center of distribution of this species is in Humboldt and Mendocino counties. Here it 

 reaches greatest size and greatest density and shows strongest reproductive capacity. In the 

 more open woodlands of the inner margins of tlio Redwood belt in this region the Madrono de- 

 velops into symmetrical trees of great beautj-, 60 to 110 feet high with trunk diameters reaching 



