58 Illustrations of Conifers. 



LAKIX LEPTOLEPI8 (Endlicher). JAPANESE LARCH. 



Gardener*' Chronicle, Vol. XIX. p. 88 (1888), with fig. 

 Veitch's Man. Conif. ed. 2, p. 897 (1900). 

 Tree* of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. II. p. 884 (1907). 



A TREE 60 to 100 feet high, with wide-spreading branches, and a trunk 

 occasionally 12 feet in girth. Bark reddish-brown, exfoliating in long 

 strips. 



Young branchlets glaucous, densely pubescent or sometimes almost 

 without hairs, becoming reddish in the second year. 



Leaves glaucous, about l inches long, obtuse at the apex; upper 

 surface flattened ; lower surface keeled ; stomatic bands conspicuous, 

 especially on the lower surface. Cones globose-conic, 1 inches long 

 by about 1 inch broad, composed of four to five spiral rows of sub- 

 orbicular scales, eight to nine in each row, with thin reflected upper 

 margins. Seed wing about f inch long. 



Larix leptolepis occurs wild on the central mountains of Japan 

 at 4,000 to 6,000 feet elevation. The timber is valuable for ship 

 building, and is also used for railway sleepers and telegraph poles. 

 This larch was first mentioned by Kaempfer in 1712. It was in- 

 troduced into cultivation by J. G. Veitch in 1861. It has been largely 

 planted of late years in the hope that it will become a profitable 

 tree, as it is quite hardy, very fast in growth, and less subject to 

 disease than the European Larch. 



A young specimen was added to the Bayfordbury collection in 

 1907. The branch photographed is from a tree at Kew. 



