16 KAMIFICATIOX. 



Douglas Fir (Abietia l)tnujla*ii) 

 Silver Fir (Abies pectmata) 

 Roman Cypress (Cupressm seniiH'ri-imi*) . 

 Sugar Pine (Pinus Lambert iana) 

 Moreton Bay Pine (Arauearia Bidinlli) . 

 Kauri Pine (Ai/athis australis) . 

 Colombian Hemlock \\- (T*n<ja Albert iana) 

 Sitka Spruce (Picea sitchensi*) . 



KAMI FIG ATION. 



As every branch originates from a bud, and upon the arrangement of 

 the buds and their development into branches the habit of the plant 

 depends, it would seem that an account of the buds should naturally 

 precede a description of the ramification. Practically the buds and the 

 young shoots that arise from them can be better studied on trees 

 whose branches have attained considerable development than on young 

 plants passing out of the cotyledonary state. For this reason pre- 

 cedence is given to ramification. 



The ramification of Taxads and Conifers is normally mbnopodial, that 

 is to say the principal axes or mother shoots continue to develop 

 more strongly than all the lateral shoots, and the lateral shoots of each 

 successive order behave in the same manner in respect to their mother 

 shoots. As pointed out by Dr. Masters, the variations in the mode <>f 

 growth depend primarily upon the development of the buds in 

 particular situations, and upon their non-development in others. 

 Development and non-development occur in rhythmic alternation as 

 regards time, and in relatively definite positions as regards space. The 

 unusual degree of regularity with which these phenomena do or do not 

 occur, brings about a style of ramification characteristic of the 

 Coniferse.* 



Throughout the Fir and Pine tribe (Abietinese) with the exception of 

 a few species of Pinus, and some abnormal states of Picea excel ^a ; and 

 also in nearly all the Taxodinese, the Araucarinese, and in many of the 

 Cupressineae, the development of the trunk is often enormous compared 

 with that of the branches. In the first named tribe, and also in the 

 Araucarinese, the primary branches are in whorls, or perhaps moie 

 properly, pseudo-whorls, f that is to say they are produced from the trunk 

 on every side, nearly in the same plane, in tiers of from three to seven 

 each, rarely more, five being the predominant number, lu Great Britain, 

 owing to climatic causes, the intervals between the tiers of branches vary 

 in length, but in the more constant climate 1 of California and other parts 



* Joum. Linn. Soc XXVII. 281 (1890). 



t In young plants of Annif<n'ui rxcelsa, cultivated in Conservatories in Great Britain, 

 the primary branches are strictly verticillate, that is, produced in a ring around the 

 common axis in exactly the same plane. And this is apparently the case in young trees 

 of Abies, Picea, and perhaps Pinus. In older trees one or more branches in the same 

 whorl are oiteii displaced from the common plane by unequal development of the stem 

 during growth, such as is shown by longitudinal and transverse sections of trunks 

 preserved in the National Museums, etc. 



