1 86 Minnesota Plant Life. 



the germination of the seed acliieving independence, is a long- 

 Hved shrub of somewhat prostrate habit, and with dark-green 

 leaves and tough-fibred w^ood in which resin does not occur, 

 while it does in plants of the related pine family. 



Pines of different sorts. The pine family includes 13 or 14 

 Minnesota species out of a total of about 300 distributed over 

 all parts of the world. In these the rudimentary seeds are pro- 

 duced upon the inner sides of scales or carpels which, like the 

 stamens, are aggregated into cones. The pines and their allies 

 may therefore be said to produce two kinds of flowers, stami- 

 nate and pistillate. 



Among the members of the pine family in Minnesota may 

 be mentioned the tamarack, a deciduous tree of social habit; 

 the pines of which three varieties, the white, the jack and the 

 red or Norway, grow within the borders of the state and are 

 dominant species of the northern forest ; the spruces, of which 

 there are three varieties, the black, the white and the muskeg; 

 the balsam or fir, common in swamps; the white cedar or 

 arbor-vitae, a tree that flourishes best in the northern part of 

 the state; the hemlock, very rare in Minnesota, but occurring 

 in two isolated patches in St. Louis county and Carlton county ; 

 and the junipers, of which there are four species, one tree-like 

 in habit and known as the red cedar, the others low shrubs and 

 called savins or junipers. 



The white pine. Among all these plants the white pine, the 

 most important timber tree of the state, is of especial interest. 

 Its wood is light, resinous and easily worked. It is used in the 

 manufacture of lumber, laths, shingles, matches, sashes, doors, 

 blinds, woodenware, telegraph poles and the masts of ships. 

 Many millions of dollars are invested in mills for its manu- 

 facture into lumber, and in railways for the transportation of 

 the logs. This tree often grows over a hundred feet in height 

 with a trunk sometimes more than three feet in diameter. Its 

 bark is rough and deeply dixidcd l)y clefts. When growing in 

 the open, as sometimes upon hills, for example, near lake shores 

 in Cass county, the lower Ijranchcs are niiicli jjrolonged and 

 the whole tree has a broadly conical form. But when a native 

 of the forest the lower branches become shaded out of existence 

 and the tree has the well-known compressed slender appear- 



