AMERICAN FOREST TREES 



The fruit of red gum is a bur, midway in appearance and size 

 between the sycamore ball and the chestnut bur. It hangs on the tree 

 until late in winter. The resin which exudes from wounds in the bark is 

 of much commercial importance and is shipped from New Orleans and 

 Mexican ports. Near the northern limit of the species' range the trees 

 yield little resin, but it is abundant farther south. In the southern 

 states it is used locally as chewing gum. It is known commercially as 

 copalm balm. 



WITCH HAZEL (Hamamelis virginiana) is a cousin to red gum, but there is 

 small resemblance. It is known as winter bloom, snapping hazel, and spotted alder. 

 Its range extends from Nova Scotia to Nebraska, Texas, and Florida. It reaches its 

 largest size among the southern Appalachian mountains where the extreme height is 

 sometimes forty feet, with a diameter of eighteen inches; but few people have ever 

 seen a witch hazel that large. It is usually fifteen or twenty feet high and three or 

 four inches in diameter. The wood is much like that of red gum, being diffuse- 

 porous with obscure medullary rays, and a thin line of summerwood. It is of little 

 commercial use; in fact, no report has been found that a single foot of it has ever been 

 used for any purpose. Yet it is a most interesting little tree. It blooms in the fall, 

 sometimes as late as the middle of November. Its rusty summer foliage turns yellow 

 in autumn, and as the leaves begin to fall, the tree bursts into delicately-scented 

 golden flowers, the most visible part of each consisting of four petals which float out 

 like streamers. At the same time that flowers are scenting the air, the seeds are 

 discharging. A full year is required to ripen them; and when dry, cold weather comes, 

 the contraction of their envelopes shoots them with sufficient force to send them 

 fifteen or twenty feet. They depend on neither wings, birds, nor squirrels to scatter 

 them. The origin of the name witch hazel is disputed; but the person who examines 

 the open-topped button which holds the black seeds, and notes the fantastic resem- 

 blance to a weasen face, will feel satisfied that he can guess the origin of the name. 

 The tree's bark is used for medicine, in extracts and gargles. 



