192 



FOREST TREES. 



Red Ash — Fraximis piibescens^ (Lam.) — is a common species, easily 



• distinguished by its downy, buds, young leaves, and petioles. It is a 

 smaller tree, and is found in similar localities with the AVhite Ash. 



Black W.^lnut. — Jnglaiis nii^ra^ (L.) 



The Walnut family has several noted representatives in Western 

 •Canada, all useful and ornamental, but none so truly valuable as the 

 Black Walnut. This noble tree is confined to the Western peninsula, 

 being rarely found in its native state East of Toronto. 



The beautifully grained and coloured wood of this tree has 

 -obtained for it a world-wide celebrity since the Industrial Exhibition in 

 185 1, where it attracted great attention among the connoisseurs in fine 

 woods, from the rich colours, the feathery waved figures and violet- 

 tinted shading, and the fine polish of the surface. It is peculiarly 



• adapted for the manufacture of massive dining-room furniture, for 

 side-boards, dining tables, book cases and such articles. 



Our Canadian upholsterers lose sight of the fact that the rich 

 heavy Black Walnut wood is not so well adapted to drawing-room 

 furniture, as the lighter Curled, and Birds-eye Maple, which is more 

 suitable where lightness and elegance are required. 



In its general character the American Black Walnut closely 

 resembles the European species ; its wide-spreading branches, abundant 

 foliage, and stately trunk render this tree one of the greatest ornaments 

 of Western Canada. The pinnate leaves consist of from fifteen to 

 twenty-one leaflets, which are ovate, pointed, serrated, of a fine, bitter, 

 aromatic scent when slightly bruised. The sterile flowers form long 

 drooping catkins of a rich olive green. The fertile flowers, solitary 

 or in clusters at the ends of the branches, appear in June. The bark of 

 the young trees is much used in dyeing, as also is the root-bark ; the 

 nuts are rugged ; the kernels sweet, but not equal in flavour and richness 

 to the European varieties of the Walnut family. 



The heart-wood has a beautiful violet tinge which deepens and turns 

 to various shades of brown, almost to black, after long exposure to the 

 air. It takes a high polish, and forms our most valuable wood for 



• cabinet work. The Black Walnut grows abundantly on the rich soils of 

 the Western and South-western parts of the Dominion between the great 

 lakes. Its average height is 120 feet, 70 feet to the first limbs, and 

 from 3 to 4 feet in diameter ; sections of the wood of six feet in 

 diameter are not uncommon ; it is a fine burning wood, but to use it 

 thus seems a great waste of valuable material. 



