THE ADIRONDACK BLACK SPRUCE. 11 



" The two species of the Blue Ridge and the Central Adiron- 

 dacks are the black spruce, P. Mariana, and the red spruce, 

 P. rubra. By most recent authors the latter has been regarded 

 as a variety of the former, but this view has been ably attacked 

 by Prof. George Lawson in a paper on ' .Remarks on the Dis- 

 tinctive Characters of the Canadian Spruces,' published, I think, 

 in 1888. He there maintains that the red spruce is distinct from 

 the black, and I am in entire accord with this opinion. The 

 white spruce is very different from either of the others by its 

 elongated cones, entirely glabrous and glaucous twigs and sterig- 

 mata, and very light-green leaves. P. rubra differs from P. 

 Mariana by its very slender twigs, which are sparingly pubes- 

 cent, the sterigmata nearly or quite glabrous, its very slender 

 light-green, nearly straight, very acute leaves, and its oblong 

 cones, which are deciduous at the end of the season, the scales 

 lacerated or two-lobed. P. Mariana has stout, very pubescent 

 twigs and sterigmata, stout and thick, merely mucrpnate, dark- 

 green, incurved leaves, and ovate, larger cones, which are per- 

 sistent for two or more years, their scales entirely or merely 

 erose. P. rubra, according to my observations, reaches a much 

 greater altitude on Mclntyre than does P. Mariana, and this 

 agrees with our collections in the Blue Ridge of Virginia. The 

 very slender twigs of P. rubra and its light-green leaves give it 

 a much more graceful aspect than is exhibited by P. Mariana" 



A noticeable peculiarity of the Adirondack spruce is the large 

 number of defective trees scattered through the forest, which are 

 known as " seamy trees," this defect or " seam " rendering them 

 unfit for lumber. The seam appears to be a crack which extends 

 up and down the trunk, varying in length and extending in some 

 cases from the butt log to the lower branches of the crown. 

 These openings vary in depth, but sometimes the crack reaches 

 to the heart. The edges of the seam are thickly coated with the 

 resinous substance known as spruce gum, which exudes and then 

 hardens, the larger and cleaner masses being gathered by the 

 " gum pickers " who earn a livelihood by this work. The seams 

 are mostly perpendicular, but in trees where the grain of the 

 wood is not straight, the seam winds upward obliquely as it 

 follows the grain. The cause of this defect has never been satis- 

 factorily explained, although various reasons have been suggested. 



These seamy trees are not as observable now as before the 

 great blight which, within the last 20 years, destroyed a 

 large proportion of the spruce throughout the Adirondack 

 forests. The seams were confined mostly to mature trees, as the 



