1054 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



PINUS BALFOURIANA, Foxtail Pine 



Pinus Balfouriana, Balfour, Oregon Exped. Report, i, t. 3, f. 1 (1853); Murray, in Gard. Chron. v. 

 332, f. 58 (1876); Sargent, Silva N. Amer., xi. 59, t. 553 (1897), and Trees N. Atner. 8 (1905); 

 Kent, Veitch's Man. Coniferce, 313 (1900); Masters, in Journ. Linn. Soc. {Bot.) xxxv. 589 

 (1904). 



A tree, usually 30 to 40 ft. high and 6 ft. in girth, rarely attaining 90 ft. in 

 height and 15 ft. in girth. Bark of young trees thin, smooth, and whitish ; becoming 

 on old trunks f in. thick, dark red brown, and deeply divided into broad flat scaly 

 ridges. Young branchlets stout, yellowish brown, covered with a minute pubescence. 

 Buds ovoid, acuminate at the apex, about \ in. long, with closely appressed brownish 

 scales. 



Leaves in fives, densely crowded on the branches, persisting ten or twelve 

 years, nearly appressed together in the clusters, incurved, about ij in. long, rigid, 

 sharp-pointed, entire in margin, green and shining on the back, whitened with 

 numerous stomatic lines on the inner surfaces ; resin-canals marginal ; basal sheath 

 speedily splitting into five segments that become reflexed and form a rosette around 

 the base of the leaf-cluster. 



Cones sub-terminal, spreading, sessile, cylindric-conic, 3^ to 5 in. long ; scales 

 narrow, elongated ; apophysis convex, rhomboidal, transversely keeled, with a minute 

 incurved prickle. Seed pale mottled with violet, \ in. long ; wing narrow and 

 oblique at the apex, about 1 in. long. 



This species is confined to California, where it is found on Scott Mountain in 

 Siskiyou County, on the mountains at the head of the Sacramento river, on Mount 

 Yolo Bally, in the northern coast range, and in the southern Sierra Nevada, where 

 it attains its largest size. It occurs at elevations of 5000 to 12,000 ft, often forming 

 the timber line, 1 and growing usually on bare rocky slopes and the summits of ridges, 

 in loose granitic soil. At high elevations it occurs in small pure scattered groves or 

 in mixture with P. albicaulis, while at lower levels it is associated with P. monticola, 

 P. contorta, var. Murrayana, and other conifers. 



The illustration (Plate 277) is from a photograph by Mr. F. R. S. Balfour in the 

 Sierra Nevada mountains, between King's River and Kaweah River, at an elevation 

 of 9000 to 10,000 ft. 



This species was discovered in 1852 on Scott Mountain by Jeffrey, who sent a 

 few seeds to the Oregon Association of Edinburgh. It is rare in cultivation, though 

 specimens of small size are to be seen in the botanic gardens of Kew, Edinburgh, 

 and Glasnevin. At Messrs. Little and Ballantyne's nursery, Carlisle, there is a tree 

 about 20 ft. high, which was planted about thirty years ago. It has never produced 

 a single cone ; but large numbers of grafts have been propagated from it. At 

 Welbeck, Elwes saw a small tree about 15 ft. high. (A. H.) 



1 Cf. Pinchot, U.S. Forest Service, Sylvical Leaflet 26 (1908). 



