56 



The Spruces 



cylindric, 5 to 7 cm, long, i to 2 cm. thick, narrowed toward each end, bluntly 

 pointed, pale green to crimson, becoming pale brown or dark brown and shining; 

 they fall off soon after shedding their seed in the autumn or early winter; their 

 scales are almost orbicular or shghtly longer than broad, thin and flexible, notched, 

 blunt, rounded or bluntly pointed at the apex, the margins usually entire; the 

 seed is about 3 mm. long, pale brown, its wing obliquely rounded. 



The wood is soft, weak, straight-grained, hght yellow and satiny; its specific 

 gravity is about 0.40. It is the principal soft wood timber of eastern Canada and 

 is used extensively in general carpentering and in the manufacture of paper pulp. 

 The northwestern Indians are supposed to use the roots in their basketry. The 

 resinous exudation furnishes some of the spruce gum of commerce. 



As an ornamental tree it has few superiors among our native evergreens for 

 cold northern sections, but in the United States, except north of central New 

 England, it does not thrive well in cultivation. 



2. RED SPRUCE Picea rubens Sargent 



Abies rubra Poiret. Pinus rubra Lambert. Picea rubra (Poiret) Dietrich 



Variously called Black spruce. Double spruce, Blue spruce, Spruce, He balsam 

 and Spruce pine, some of which perhaps arc more appropriate to the Swamp 



spruce, this occurs from Prince Edward 

 Island to northern New York, south- 

 ward to Cape Cod, continuing further 

 south in the highlands and mountains 

 to North CaroUna, but it is not known 

 to occur west of the Alleghany Moun- 

 tains. Its maximum height of 35 me- 

 ters with a trunk diameter of one meter 

 is attained in the highlands of New York 

 and New England. 



The branches are slender and spread- 

 ing, forming a conic tree with branches 

 to the ground, when in the open; in the 

 thick woods, however, it is usually devoid 

 of branches for much of its length and 

 at higher altitudes it is frequently re- 

 duced to a straggling shrub. The bark 

 is 7 to 15 mm. thick, much fissured and 

 broken into irregular, close scales of a 

 red-brown color. The stout twigs and persistent leaf-stalks are covered with pale 

 hairs, hght yellow, becoming dark brown with darker hairs, and finally nearly 

 black. The winter buds are o^^oid, sharp-pointed, their scales close, light red- 

 brown and sharply pointed. The 4-sided linear leaves are about 16 mm. long, 



Fig. 43. Red Spruce. 



