Larix 379 



LARIX DAHURICA 



Larix dahurica, Turczaninow, Bull. Soc. Nat. Mosc. xi. loi (1838); Trautvetter, Fl. Imag. Fl. Fuss. 



48, t. 32 (1844); Kegel, Gartenflora, xx. 105, t. 684 (187 1); Kent, Veitch's Man. Coniferce, 



390 (1900). 

 Larix pendula, Salisbury,^ Trans. Linn. Soc. viii. 314 (1807); Lawson, Agric. Man. 387 (1836); 



Forbes, Finet. Woburnense, 137, t. 46 (1839). 

 Larix europcBa, De CandoUe, van dahurica, Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. iv. 2352 (1838). 

 Larix americana, Michaux, var. pendula, Loudon, op. cit. 2400. 



Finus pendula, Alton, Hort. Kew. iii. 369 (1789); Lambert, Finus, i. 56, t. 36 (1803). 

 Finus dahurica, Fischer, ex Turczaninow, loc. cit. 

 Abies pendula, Poiret, Lamarck? s Diet. vi. 514 (1804). 

 Abies Gmelini, Ruprecht, Beit. Fflanz. Fuss. Feich. ii. 56 (1845). 



A tree attaining in Saghalien 140 feet to 150 feet in height, but in Siberia 

 usually much smaller. Bark scaling in broad, thin, irregularly quadrangular plates. 

 Young branchlets slender, glabrous, becoming pinkish at the end of the season, 

 shining brown in the second year ; older branchlets yellowish grey. Shoots girt at 

 the base by a sheath of the previous season's bud-scales, with no ring of pubescence 

 visible. Short shoots slender, dark brown or blackish, glabrous. Terminal buds 

 globose, glabrous, resinous, with the basal scales subulately pointed. Lateral buds 

 hemispherical, resinous, dark brown, glabrous. Apical buds broadly conical and 

 surrounded by a ring of brown pubescence. Leaves light green, similar to those of 

 L. europcea in size and arrangement of the stomata, with the tips usually blunter than 

 in that species. 



Staminate flowers sessile, smaller than those of the European larch. Pistillate 

 flowers ovoid, red, with the bracts and scales more closely appressed than in the 

 common larch, making the flower narrower and shorter ; bracts slightly recurved, 

 \ inch long, oblong, with a shallow notch at the upper margin between two pointed 

 projections ; mucro short, less than ^ inch long. 



Cones variable in size, dependent upon the number of the scales, f to \\ inch 

 long, cylindrical, slightly narrowed at the apex, where the scales gape open in the 

 ripe cone, composed of three to four spiral rows of scales, six to eight in each row, 

 bracts concealed. Scales longer than broad, about \ inch long ; upper margin 

 rounded, truncate, or slightly emarginate, bevelled, slightly denticulate, not recurved ; 

 outer surface glabrous,* channelled, shining light brown when ripe. Bracts not 

 exserted, about \ inch long, much shorter than the scales. Seeds lying upon the 

 scale in slight depressions, their wings narrowly divergent and not extending quite 

 to its upper margin. Seed about \ inch long ; together with its wing scarcely 

 \ inch long ; wing broadest just above the seed. 



The Dahurian larch is a native of eastern Siberia, Manchuria, Corea, and 



' Though this is the oldest correct name under the genus, I have not adopted it, as it has been erroneously applied to 

 the American larch, and its use now would cause considerable confusion. 



" Cultivated specimens, as those from Boynton and Murthly Castle, occasionally have slightly pubescent scales ; but the 

 cones and seeds in all other respects are typical of L. dahurica. 



