STUDIES OF LEAF AND TREE (PART I) 



BY DR. R. W. SHUFELDT, C.M.Z.S. 





TO ALL who have interested themselves in the study 

 of trees, it is a well known fact that they offer many 

 different angles from which they may be considered. 

 Take the trees of any region those found in the eastern 

 United States for example ; they are first studied with 

 the view of distinguishing one species from another, and 

 also with the view of 

 discovering whether there 

 be any hybrids among 

 them. There are many 

 parts of trees availa- 

 ble for the purpose of 

 species discrimination, and 

 they should all be studious- 

 ly examined and compar- 

 ed; for it is only through 

 thorough and intelligent 

 comparison of parts that 

 we are led with certainty 

 to correct identification of 

 known types. In the first 

 place, we may study the 

 form or contour of a tree 

 as it appears to us in full 

 foliage, as well as in win- 

 ter when all of its leaves 

 have fallen. This does not 

 apply to such trees as the 

 conifers and others that re- 

 tain their foliage the en- 

 tire year around, and only 

 change their outlines and 

 gen eral appearance 

 through age. 



Leaves furnish an enor- 

 mous assistance in identi- 

 fying a species of tree, and 

 in many instances the leaf 

 alone is sufficient for such 

 a purpose. The flowers 

 and fruit of a tree stand 

 in the same category with 

 the leaves ; perhaps next to 

 these three characters we may place that of the bark, 

 while the roots, when they are accessible, the buds and 

 leaf-scars and the plan of their arrangements, are all of 

 the greatest value. 



When we come to know the various kinds of trees 

 apart, there next arises the question of their taxonomy 

 or classification; and for those species found in the re- 

 gion above named, this is a problem which, through the 

 labors of students of the subject of the present as well 

 as of the past have very largely been settled. So that 

 now, when a new species of tree is discovered, it is more 



EXAMPLES OF GIANT SYCAMORE TREES (Platanus occidentalis). 



Fig. 16 Group in Maryland on the banks of the Potomac River, at Great 

 Falls, above Washington. This will offer a familiar scene to hundreds of 

 people whose rambles have led them beneath these ponderous Buttonballs. 



or less readily described, and assigned at once, as a new 

 species, to its proper genus and family. 



The vernacular names of trees and their origin forms 

 another interesting chapter in tree study. 



Still another important department of this science is 

 the matter of the regional distribution of trees, or where 



the various species nor- 

 mally occur in nature. 

 Then we have the changes 

 in trees due to their 

 domestication, crossing 

 and grafting, and other 

 changes due to passing 

 from one environment in- 

 to another and entirely dif- 

 ferent one. Such shif tings 

 sometimes produce the 

 most radical and re- 

 markable alteration in 

 many species of trees 

 should they survive the 

 change. 



In tree study, forestry 

 in all of its branches and 

 as practiced by various na- 

 tions is an enormous and 

 extremely important sub- 

 ject. Indeed, it is much 

 too large to be entered up- 

 on at this time, more than 

 to mention its importance 

 as a department of tree 

 study. It is international 

 in its scope, and, with some 

 nations, it has been dealt 

 with as a science for cen- 

 turies. 



Julia Ellen Rogers, who 

 has given us a wonderfully 

 useful book on Trees, says 

 that "Forestry is one 

 grand division of the great 

 art of Agriculture, 'the cul- 

 tivation of the field.' Silviculture and forestry are used 

 as synonyms. Arboriculture includes besides forest trees 

 those that are grown for their fruit, and for ornament. 

 Hence it includes a large part of horticulture and land- 

 scape gardening the growing of trees for any purpose. 

 Silviculture is, properly speaking, that branch of forestry 

 which deals with the scientific production of a crop of 

 trees. Forest regulation is the business branch, which 

 manages the animal outlay and returns of the for- 

 est. It has the lumbering and marketing of the 

 crop in charge. Dendrology is one of the fundamen- 



