Handbook of Tkkks ok the North i:k.\ States and Can. 



■21 



The Tamarack is a beautiful tree not often 

 over ()U ft. in height nor witli trunk niiuf than 

 ti ft. in thickness. Its liuiik is usually 

 straiglit and columnar or slightly tapering, 

 witli scaly bark showing little tendency to 

 become ridged and its top is usually of narrow- 

 pyramidal form with short horizontal l)ranches 

 and open airy foliage. It is distinctively a 

 tree of swampy lands, venturing farther out 

 on low lake shores and quaking sphagnum 

 bogs than any other tree excepting sometimes 

 the Swamp Spruce and these regions it char- 

 acterizes in summer with its pale green foliage 

 or lights up in autumn with its covering of 

 bright yellow. To the northward in its range 

 where it is very abundant, it is found also on 

 well drained uplands forming in places ex- 

 tensive tracts of open forest. With the Black 

 Spruce it forms the vanguard of the forests 

 in the subarctic regions and there maintains 

 tree-form battling with the elements while its 

 companion is prone upon the ground but still 

 engaged in the struggle. 



The wood, of which a cubic foot when dry 



weighs 38.86 lbs., is rather hard, heavy, strong 



and very durable in contact with the soil. It 



is of a light orange-brown color with thin 



lighter sap-wood and is valued for railway 



ties, posts, planks and lumber for interior 



finishing.2 



Lravrf! very slender, numerous, in fascicles on 

 short lateral "spurs, or singly on new shoots, %- 

 IV4 in. Ions, linear, triansular, pale green, turning 

 yellow and falling in autumn. Floicrrfi appear 

 with the leaves : staminate yellow, subglobose 

 from leafless scaly buds ; pistillate oblong with 

 rose-red rounded "scales, on lateral mostly leafy 

 spurs. Cones oblong, about Vo in. long on short 

 peduncles and composed of about 12 thin concave 

 suborbicular persistent scales about twice as long 

 as their bracts ; seeds about Vs in. long, with light 

 brown wing broadest at about the middle.' 



1. Syn. L. laracina (DuRoi) Koch. 



2. A. W., I, 23. 

 For genus see 





m&^F 



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