20 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. ROSACEA, 
one half to three quarters of an inch long, and early deciduous. The flowers, which appear in Texas 
early in March, and in Pennsylvania two months later, when the leaves are half grown, are produced in 
two to five-flowered umbels, and are borne on slender glabrous green pedicels which vary from one 
third to two thirds of an inch in length; on some individuals they are unisexual by the abortion of the 
pistils, and are, when expanded, an inch across and exhale a disagreeable odor. The calyx-tube is 
acutely obconic, light red, glabrous or puberulous, and green on the inside, with acuminate lobes, 
reflexed after anthesis, and slightly pubescent on the outer, and pilose on the inner surface. The petals 
are pure white, half an inch long and a quarter of an inch broad, rounded and irregularly laciniate at 
the apex, and contracted below into long narrow claws which are bright red at the base. The fruit, 
which ripens in June at the south, and from the end of August to early October at the north, is subglo- 
bose or rarely slightly elongated, and usually rather less than an inch in diameter ; in ripening it turns 
from green to orange, often with a red cheek, and when fully ripe is bright red, usually destitute of 
bloom, and more or less conspicuously marked with pale spots; the skin is tough, thick, acerb, and 
easily separated from the bright yellow succulent rather juicy acid flesh which adheres to the oval 
stone; this is slightly rugose, pomted at the apex, more or less contracted at the base, turgid, often 
nearly as thick as it is broad, and slightly and acutely ridged on the ventral, and obscurely grooved on 
the dorsal suture. 
Prunus Americana is distributed from middle and northern New Jersey’ and central New York? 
to Nebraska,’ the valley of the upper Missouri River in Montana,‘ the eastern slopes of the Rocky 
Mountains of Colorado,’ the Chattahoochee region of western Florida, the valley of the Rio Grande in 
southern New Mexico, and the mountains of northeastern Mexico. In the middle and northern states 
it is found in rich soil, growing along the borders of streams and swamps, where it often forms thickets 
of considerable extent; in the southern Atlantic states it sometimes inhabits river-swamps, which are 
submerged during several months of each year, and west of the Mississippi River it grows on bottom- 
lands and sometimes on dry limestone uplands. At the north the Wild Plum-tree is rarely more than 
ten or fifteen feet in height, and it is in southern Arkansas and eastern Texas that it attains its greatest 
dimensions. 
The wood of Prunus Americana is heavy, hard, close-grained, and strong. It has a lustrous surface 
and is dark rich brown tinged with red, with thin light-colored sapwood, and many medullary rays. 
The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.7313, a cubic foot weighing 46.95 pounds. 
The fruit is sometimes used in the preparation of jellies and preserves, and is eaten raw or cooked.‘ 
Prunus Americana was first described by Humphrey Marshall, in his Arbustum Americanum, 
published in 1785; and in most subsequent works it has been confounded with Prunus nigra of Aiton, 
published four years later.” ; 
As an ornamental plant Prunus Americana has real value; the long wand-like branches form a 
wide graceful head, which is handsome in winter, and in spring is covered with masses of pure white 
flowers, followed by ample bright foliage and abundant showy fruit.® 
1 Britton, Cat. Pl. N. J. 91. 
2 Dudley, Bull. Cornell Univ. ii. 27 (Cayuga Fl.). 
8 Bessey, Bull. Agric. Exper. Stat. Nebraska, iv. art. iv. 16. 
4 Where it was collected by Lester F. Ward, whose specimens 
are preserved in the U. S. Nat. Herb. 
5 Coulter, Man. Rocky Mt. Bot. 76. 
® Much attention has been given in late years by American po- 
mologists to the selection and cultivation of the best fruited varie- 
ties of Prunus Americana, and their lists now contain the names of 
many Plum-trees which are selected wild forms of this species. 
Of these perhaps the best known and the most generally esteemed 
are De Soto, Itaska, Forest Garden, Louisa, Minnetonka, Cheney, 
Deep Creek, Kickapoo, Forest Rose, and Miner. 
7 In the Linnean Herbarium there is an unnamed specimen of 
Prunus Americana without flowers or fruit, and without locality, 
from Kalm the Swedish traveler, who included in his list of trees 
growing in the woods near Philadelphia, in 1748, the Wild Plum- 
tree and the Sloe-Shrub, which he called Prunus domestica and 
Prunus spinosa (Travels, English ed. i. 67, 68). 
8 As an ornamental plant Prunus Americana is not so often seen 
in the gardens of the eastern and northern states as Prunus nigra, 
which is a less beautiful plant although its flowers are earlier and 
considerably larger. It is well established in the Arnold Arboretum, 
where it flowers and fruits abundantly every year, and has proved 
to be one of the most beautiful plants of the genus. 
