32 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. -— ROsACER. 
southern Oregon to central California. It is found in the neighborhood of streams, sometimes forming 
thickets of considerable extent, on dry rocky hills and in open woods, and is most common in southern 
Oregon and northern California, and there produces the best and most abundant fruit, reaching its great- 
est size on the borders of small streams, in deep rich rather moist soil, where it grows with the Oregon 
White Oak, the Choke Cherry, the Oregon Hawthorn, the Crab-apple, and various species of Cornel. 
In central California, where Prunus subcordata is common on the foothills of the coast ranges, and 
often ascends to considerable elevations on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada, it is usually a low 
shrub, producing sparingly small acid fruit. 
The wood of Prunus subcordata is heavy, hard, and close-grained, with a satiny surface susceptible 
of taking a good polish. It is pale brown, with thin lighter colored sapwood composed of five or six 
layers of annual growth, and contains many thin inconspicuous medullary rays. The specific gravity 
of the absolutely dry wood is 0.6412, a cubic foot weighing 40.01 pounds. 
The fruit of Prunus subcordata is collected in Oregon and northern California, and is consumed 
in large quantities both fresh and dried, and is used for preserves and jellies.’ 
The first botanists who explored Oregon and California failed to notice the Wild Plum, and it 
was not known until 1836 or 1837, when Karl Theodore Hartweg” found it in the upper valley of the 
Sacramento River. 
1 In northern California, where for several years some attention It has also been found useful as stock upon which to graft varieties: 
has been paid to improving it, Prunus subcordata produces in culti- of the European Plums. (See Rep. Cal. Agric. Soc. 1858, 183. — 
vation more abundant crops of larger fruit than are borne on the Pacific Rural Press, iv. 163, 198. — Wickson, California Fruits and 
wild trees ; and the quality of the fruit of selected seedlings shows How to Grow Them, ed. 2, 52.) 
that valuable garden varieties can be obtained from this species. 2 See ii. 34, 
EXPLANATION OF THE PLATE. 
Puate CLIV. Prunus suBcoRDATA. 
1. A flowering branch, natural size. 
2. Vertical section of a flower, enlarged. 
3. A fruiting branch, natural size. 
4. Vertical section of a fruit, natural size. 
5, 6, and 7. Stones, natural size. 
8. An embryo, enlarged. 
9. Winter branchlet, natural size. 
