Meyer: Seeking Plant Immigrants 



119 



AVENUE OF KARAKACH TREES. 



This fine row of Ulmus campestris umbraculifera was photographed on the imperial estate 

 Murgab, at Bairam-AH near Merw, Russian Turkestan, on June 16, 1910. The tree 

 endures drought and a fair amount of alkali, and is as useful for shade purposes as is the 

 umbrella tree {Melia azederach) so widely cultivated in desert portions of North America. 

 Grafted forms of the Karakach are propagated by the rich in Turkestan, in order to 

 ensure a solid head of shade. (Fig. 10.) 



■SO few photographs of Central Asia are 

 to be had, is it? Well, I then called on 

 W. A. Palletsky, in charge of the sand- 

 binding work along the railroad in 

 Central Asia. I found him to be a most 

 pleasant man who had a railroad trolley 

 come before his house and off we flew 

 over the imposing Amu-daria river, 

 along whose level shores some of the 

 world's finest melons grow, along sandy 

 hill and plains, all planted with sand- 

 binding plants until we were eight or 

 ten werst out, where the plantations 

 were the oldest. It is most interesting 

 to see how the tall bushes of Calligonum 

 caput-niediisae, C. arborescens, Salsola 

 richteri and Haloxylon ammodendron 

 have grown into some sort of a forest in 

 a soil that is almost pure sand and, 

 worse than that, a moving sand! And 



stranger, even, to see how a few seeds of 

 the Chinese Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus 

 glandulosa) have found lodging between 

 these real desert plants and have grown 

 vigorously, too, and are of fairly good 

 sizes now. Mr. Palletsky said the real 

 Saxaul {Haloxylon ammodendron) is 

 an aristocrat — in other words, it is not 

 a plant one can plant straight away on a 

 shifting sand. First other vegetation 

 has to make the soil firm, after that the 

 Saxaul will grow. To arrest a shifting 

 sand-hill, one first has to plant various 

 Calligonums, then Salsola richteri and 

 after that Haloxyon ammodendron. Of 

 the Calligonums there is an immense 

 mass. Up to the present fifty-seven 

 different species have been found, and 

 there are still more. However, only 

 thirtv have been scientificallv deter- 



