PINUS SYLVESTRIS, Scots Pine 



Finns sylvestris, Linnaeus, Sp. PI. looo (excl. var.) (1753); Lambert, Genus Pinus, i. tab. L (1803); 

 Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. iv. 2153 (1838) ; Willkomm, Forstliche Flora, 193 (1887) ; Mathieu, 

 Flore Fore stiire., 579 (1897); Kent, in Veitch's Man. Coniferce, j,i<) (1900); Kirchner, Loew 

 u. Schroter, Lebengeschich. Bliitenpfl. Mitteleuropas, i. 175 (1904); Mayr, Fremdldnd. Wald- u. 

 Parkbdume, 347 (1906); Borthwick, in Trans. R. Eng. Arb. Sac. vi. 205 (1906). 



A TREE commonly 100 feet, rarely attaining 150 feet in height, with a girth of 

 10 to 15 feet. Stem usually straight and cylindrical, with the branches regularly 

 whorled in young trees, forming a pyramidal crown ; in older and isolated trees, 

 branching irregular, with a flattened crown. Bark different in the lower and upper 

 parts of the trunk ; towards the base thick, fissured into irregular longitudinal plates, 

 scaly, and reddish brown or greyish brown in colour ; on the upper part of the stem,^ 

 owing to the outer portion continually falling off in thin papery scales, the bark 

 remains very thin, smooth, shining and bright red. Young shoots greenish, smooth 

 and shining; becoming greyish brown in the second year; marked with the pulvini 

 of the scale-leaves, which are early deciduous. Buds long-oval, pointed, usually non- 

 resinous, covered by lanceolate acuminate scales, fimbriated on their edges, the 

 upper ones with their tips free and not recurved. Leaves two in a bundle ; sheaths 

 at first white, \ inch long, speedily becoming shrivelled, brown, and short ; the pair 

 of leaves close together, but not appressed, usually about 2 inches long but varying 

 under different conditions from i to 4 inches, dark green with interrupted lines of 

 stomata on the convex side, glaucous with many well-defined lines of stomata on the 

 flat inner side, plano-convex in cross-section, linear, stiff", acute at the apex, somewhat 

 bent, smooth, finely serrate in margin ; resin-canals marginal. The leaves persist 

 usually three years. 



Male flowers in dense clusters at the lower part of the current year's shoot, 

 \ inch long, oval, short-stalked, surrounded at the base by four yellowish bracts ; 

 anther with small rounded upright connective. Female flowers, solitary, opposite 

 or occasionally whorled, apparently terminating the young shoot, erect at first, but 

 becoming pendant immediately after pollination, stalked, globose, reddish, composed 

 of rounded bracts and almost circular ovular scales, the latter having a beak-like 

 process on the upper side and bearing two minute ovules. 



Cones shortly stalked, variable in shape, usually ovoid-conic with an acute apex, 

 oblique or nearly symmetrical at the base, greyish or dull brown in colour, i to 3 



' According to Shaw of Boston, who is the greatest living authority on the genus Pimts, this peculiarity of the bark of 

 the upper part of the tree being thin and reddish, owing to the constant shedding of scales, occurs only in three pines, viz. 

 P. sylvestris, P. densiflora, and P. pattila. 



Ill 571 R 



