24 BOTANY OF THE ROUTE. 



Pew birds are strictly peculiar to them, though almost all the smaller species, shunning the 

 dense forests, frequent their borders. The shore lark and Savannah sparrow are, perhaps, the 

 only land birds never seen in the woods, while some waders frequent their marshy portions, 

 with the brown crane and the Canada goose, which are never or rarely seen along the sea shore. 

 The prairie chicken, sage fowl, Oregon and California quails are worthy of introduction. 



FORESTS OF THE WESTERN REGIONS. 



The forests of the western regions deserve a particular description since, though they are 

 less important than the prairies to the agriculturist, they are one of the principal sources of 

 commercial wealth to the Territory. 



As I believe no attempt has been yet made to point out in a systematic manner their natural 

 characters, distribution and useful properties, I will here mention each species in the order of 

 its importance. 



It will be observed that they are nearly all of different species from those constituting the 

 forests east of the Cascade range, though some of them are supposed to extend much further 

 eastward, north of the Territory, as they reappear upon some of the highest parts of the most 

 eastern Rocky mountains. 



The country bordering on the lower Columbia has been celebrated ever since its discovery 

 for the gigantic growth of its forests. Even species so nearly resembling those of the Atlantic 

 States as to be generally considered identical attain a much greater size. 



The mild climate and abundant moisture causing a longer growing season may be con 

 sidered, perhaps, as one cause of this increase in size. It seems certainly to have an influence 

 upon many smaller plants, and most strikingly so on cultivated vegetables, whose seeds we 

 know to have been brought from the east. The great height to which trees grow may also be 

 due to the rarity of lightning, as it is well known that thunder-storms, though common on the 

 mountains, are very rare in the valleys. 



CONIFEROUS TREES. 



The tree most abundant, and therefore most characteristic of these forests, is that of which 

 varieties are known in the Territory as &quot;red&quot; and &quot;black fir,&quot; (ABIES DOUGLASSII.) It is, at 

 the same time, the species most generally useful. Its foliage resembles that of the white spruce 

 of Canada, but the leaves are larger and longer. Its cone is also very different from that of 

 any other spruce, being ornamented with three-parted bracts between the scales, which at once 

 distinguish it. Its trunk is straight, commonly without branches for fifty feet or more, and 

 covered with a thick bark, resembling, in its ashy color and deep furrows, that of the chestnut. 

 The wood is rather coarse-grained and liable to shrink, but is more used for lumber than any 

 other, being adapted for all kinds of rough work exposed to the weather. It also forms excel 

 lent fire-wood, even when green, and in dead trees the bark and wood are often so full of resin 

 as to burn like a torch. From its combustibility extensive tracts of this forest get burnt every 

 year, taking fire from friction or any other slight cause. During our ascent of the western 

 slopes of the Cascade range we passed for days through dead forests, perhaps burnt by ignition 

 from the hot ashes which were thrown out from Mount St. Helen s several years before; but 

 large tracts were on fire at the same time, filling the air with smoke, so that we could not see 

 the surrounding country for several days. Large tracts of the eastern slopes of the Coast range 

 are also desolated by the same cause. 



