Balsam Poplar 



171 



The old bark is thick, brown, and strongly ridged, that of young stems pale 

 gray or nearly white, and smooth or nearly 

 so. The young twigs are slender, smooth, 

 brown, and round or somewhat angled. The 

 buds arc brown and ven^ resinous, pointed, 

 about I cm. long. The leaves are rhombic- 

 lanceolate, 5 to 15 cm. long, rather abmptly 

 long-pointed, nearly equally bluntly toothed, 

 except near the base and apex, smooth on 

 both sides, bright green and somewhat shin- 

 ing on the upper side, paler green on the 

 lower, the base usually wedge-shaped, but 

 sometimes rounded; they are drooping or 

 spreading, with round, slender stalks fully 

 one half as long as the blades; the small 

 stipules are ovate. The catkins appear in 

 April or May, and when in flower are about 

 3 cm. long, their scales sharply cut into 

 numerous fiUform lobes; there are 15 or 20 stamens in each staminate flower; the 

 pistillate flowers are stalked, the smooth ovary surmounted by the irregularly 

 lobed stigmas. The pistillate catkins become 10 to 15 cm. long in fruit, with 

 ovoid, bluntish capsules 6 to 8 mm. long, borne on slender stalks 3 to 5 mm. long. 



The w^ood closely resembles that of the Narrow-leaved Cottonwood, P. angust- 

 ifolia James. The tree has been much planted for shade and ornament in and 

 about cities and towns within its range. 



Fig. 126. Rydberg's Cottonwood. 



6. BALSAM POPLAR Populus balsamifera Linnaeus 



The Balsam poplar, or Tacamahac, inhabits 

 either moist or dry soil, but prefers river and 

 lake shores and the edges of swamps, sometimes 

 reaching a height of 30 meters or more, with a 

 tRmk 2 to 2.3 meters in diameter. It is dis- 

 tributed from Newfoundland to Hudson Bay 

 and Alaska, south to Maine, Vermont, western 

 New York, Michigan, South Dakota, Wyo- 

 ming, and Oregon. 



The bark of old trunks is up to 2.5 cm. 

 thick, reddish gray and ridged, that of young 

 stems thinner and hght brown or gray. The 

 young twigs are round, stout, somewhat hair}-, 

 becoming smooth, reddish brown and shining, 

 Balsam Poplar. finally gray. The very resinous buds are 2.5 



