Nyssa 511 



the borders of swamps ; but in the south grows also on high wooded mountain slopes. 

 It is very variable in form, sometimes branching close to the ground ; but oftener 

 has a stout straight trunk, covered with light brown deeply furrowed bark, which is 

 often curiously divided into hexagonal scales. Plate 144 b shows the trunk of a tree 

 in America. The upper branches are twiggy and usually crooked. The glossy 

 green leaves are rarely disfigured by fungi or insects, and turn to deep red in 

 autumn. An excellent illustration of a group of trees growing near a pond in 

 Massachusetts is given in Garden and Forest, iii. 491, which resemble in habit the 

 Siberian or Japanese larch ; and this is the form which the trees often assume in 

 low swampy ground in New England. Another figure in the same journal, vii. 275, 

 fig. 46, shows the habit of a tree growing in drier ground in Pennsylvania. 



Cultivation 



Nyssa sylvatica was in cultivation at Whitton, near Hounslow, in 1750. It is, 

 when well grown, a very distinct and beautiful tree, the brilliant scarlet assumed by 

 its leaves in autumn rendering it a very desirable ornament for the park or pleasure 

 ground. 



Sargent says that one reason why this tree is not more generally planted is that 

 its long roots with few rootlets make it difficult to transplant, and that it must be 

 either planted out when quite young or frequently transplanted in the nursery. 

 Those which I have raised from seed grew slowly the first year, but seemed to 

 ripen their young wood better than many American trees. When pricked out singly 

 into pots in the following spring they all died. 



We have seen very few specimens in this country, the only one of great size 

 being the tree' at Strathfieldsaye, which measured in 1897 74 feet high by 5 feet 

 5 inches in girth. It grows on rather heavy soil. This tree was reported by 

 Loudon to be about 30 feet high in 1838, and is probably over 100 years old (Plate 

 145). It produced seed in 1906 which appeared to be mature. 



There is a tree at Munden, near Watford, the seat of the Hon. A. Holland 

 Hibbert, which has a short bole of 4^ feet long with a girth of 3 feet 3 inches, 

 dividing into two stems, the branches of which are very spreading, forming a crown 

 of foliage 38 feet in diameter ; the total height is only 20 feet. Mr. Daniel Hill of 

 Watford, who kindly sent these measurements, says that the fork has been leaded 

 over ; and it is possible that the tree lost its leader early from some accident, and in 

 consequence subsequently assumed its present peculiar habit. 



At White Knights, near Reading, there was a large tree of this species which 

 was cut down some years ago ; and there are now many suckers arising from the 

 roots.^ There is another tree at Bicton about 35 feet high by i\ f'^^^, which in 

 August 1906 had full-sized fruit upon it which seemed likely to ripen. 



The girth of this tree given in Card. Chroti. xxvi. 162 (1899), is evidently erroneous, 14 feet 10^ inches being 

 a misprint for 4 feet loj inches. 



2 Schenck, in Bilttnore Lectures on Sylviculture, 56 (1905), says that in the forest old trees are often surrounded by an 

 abundance of seedlings ; but on abandoned fields it seems to come up from sprouts and not from seeds. 



