Table Mountain Pine 



47 



many wide resinous bands; its specific gravity is about 0.53. It is quite durable 

 and is used to some extent as lumber, and for pumps and water tubes. It is 

 extensively used for fuel. 



It is hardy to a considerable distance northward of its range, and although a 

 rapid grower is not admired as an ornamental, other species being prefered. It 

 is, however, very valuable as a reforester, soon forming a rapid-growing covering 

 for worn-out and neglected lands. 



It is also called by many other names, as Scrub pine. Short pine, Short-leaved 

 pine. Cedar pine, River pine. Nigger pine, New Jersey pine, Shortschat pine, 

 and Shortshucks. 



35. TABLE MOUNTAIN PINE Pinus pungens Michaux 



A tree of the mountains, on dry, gravelly, or rocky slopes from New Jersey 

 and Pennsylvania to North Carolina and northern Georgia; its maximum height 

 is 18 meters with a trunk diameter of i m., often much smaller and frequently 

 fruiting when only several meters high. It is also called Southern mountain pine 

 and Prickly pine. 



The trunk is short and stout, the horizontal branches short, the lowest pendu- 

 lous at the tips, the upper ascending, usually 

 forming a broad open tree, often irregular; 

 when crowded the branches are few near the 

 top, and form an irregular narrow round head. 

 The bark is about 2 cm. thick, fissured into 

 irregular plates with a loose, dark reddish 

 brown scaly surface. The twigs are stout, 

 smooth, and light orange at first, becoming 

 darker, somewhat purpHsh and finally dark 

 brown, and roughened by the dark, persistent 

 bases of the bud-scales. The branch-buds are 

 narrowly elliptic, about 12 mm. long, taper- 

 ing to a blunt point, the lateral ones much 

 smaller. The leaves are in sheathed fascicles 

 of 2, hght bluish green, 4 to 10 cm. long, 1.5 

 mm. thick, stiff and somewh^ twisted, finely 

 toothed, sharp callous-pointed, marked by 

 many rows of stomata, and contain 2 to 5 resin-ducts of various sizes in the pulp 

 and 2 fibrovascular bundles; they are crowded at the ends of the twigs and per- 

 sist for two or three years. The staminate flowers are in long, loose spike-hke 

 clusters, oblong, i to 1.5 cm. long, their anthers yellow. The pistillate flowers are 

 lateral, somewhat clustered, stout-stalked, subglobose to ovoid, the scales ovate, 

 narrowed into stiff, long, slender tips, the bracts large, nearly round. The cones 

 are spreading, usually in clusters of 3, sometimes 5 or more, ovoid when closed, 



Fig. 37. Table Mountain Pine. 



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