14 JOHN MACOUN ON 



more or less pronounced at the extreme limit of trees, about 7,000 to 7,500 feet altitude, and 

 in September the latter tree stands out very distinctly owing to the changing of its leaves 

 from green to yellow. 



All the valleys are filled with white spruce, and the mountain slopes, where gravel or 

 sand jiredominates, ai-e covered with pine. As we ascend above 5,000 feet, the pines are 

 left behind and spruce and fir with Douglas fir take their place. 



Descending from the Rocky mountain summit by the Kicking Horse Pass, we meet the 

 western cedar as a mere shrub, but in the Columbia Valley it becomes a gigantic tree, often 

 having a diameter of ten feet, in the valley of Beaver Creek. Ascending the slope on the 

 west side of the valley we come at once into a belt of the western hemlock and white 

 pine, which is characteristic of all the mountains from here to the Coast Eange. Above 

 these trees, but often intermixed with them, as at the Glacier hotel, Selkirk Mountains, 

 Patton's hemlock is found capping the mountains or forming the last groves on their sides. 

 On the Coast Range a change takes place, and the upper slopes are clothed with this 

 tree and the white fir (Abies amahilis). Fine groves of this shapely tree are to be seen here, 

 and the diflTerence between it and the Rocky mountain species [Abies subalpina) is very 

 apparent, as the former has green cones and the latter bright purple ones. Descending 

 the Columbia River, groves of the western larch are seen below the Upper Arrow Lake, and 

 this fine tree is not uncommon on the lower slopes of the mountains on both the east and 

 west sides of the Gold Range. 



Generally speaking, all the valleys throughout both the Gold and Selkirk ranges are 

 filled with cedar and spruce, and the mountain slopes are covered with Douglas fir and 

 hemlock. The trees are in all cases well-developed, and from their size are suited for any 

 purpose. This is the character of all the timber from the Columbia valley to the western 

 slopes of the Gold Range. The valleys of the streams discharging westward from the latter 

 range into the Eagle and SpuUamacheen rivers and Shuswap Lake are also filled with fine 

 timber of the same species. Passing Avcstward from these mountains we come gradually 

 into a drier region, and the country becomes open, with only scattered groves or single 

 trees on the lower slopes and plateaus, and the yellow pine (Pinus ponderosa) so characteristic 

 of the dry interior of British Columbia is the chief feature in the landscape. 



The light rainfall east of the Coast Range in British Columbia prevents the growth of a 

 continuous forest outside the flood-plains of the rivers so that yellow pine and Douglas fir 

 are scattered over the Okanagan and Kamloops country until we reach an altitude of about 

 3,500 feet. Above this is a belt of dense forest composed chiefly of spruce and black pine 

 {Pinus Murrayana) with which is mixed, in places, a considerable quantity of Douglas fir. 

 This forms a zone of from 2,000 to 3,000 feet above which the forest thins out and grassy 

 meadows, with beautiful groves of fir, cap the mountains. 



The transition from the arid region of British Columbia to the humid coast district is a 

 sudden one. As soon as the summit of the range is passed a change occurs, and descending 

 by the valley of the Fraser, this is noted a few miles above Boston Bar where the mountain 

 barrier closes the valley to the moisture-laden winds from the Pacific. Descending into the 

 lower valley of the Fraser causes little change in the trees outside the flood-plains, but they 

 at once increase in size and more than double their height. It is in the lower Fraser valley 

 that we first see the Pacific coast forest and are lost in wonder at the height of the Douglas 

 fir, Menzies spruce and the western cedar. Trees of Douglas fir 300 feet high and ten or 



