LI8 



AMERICAN FOREST TREES 



seventy or eighty years is reached. Many manufacturers of ash tool 

 handles prefer this species to any other ash, because of its thick, white 

 sapwood. It is often made into handles for hoes, rakes, shovels, pitch- 

 forks, spades, and snaths for scythes. Makers of vehicles draw liberally 

 upon this wood within its range, as do furniture makers and the manu- 

 facturers of flooring. It is regarded as harder than white ash, and 

 consequently better flooring material. 



LBATHEKLEAF ASH (Fraxinus velutina) changes its velvety leaves to a leathery 

 condition, hence the conflict in the meanings of its two names. Velutina means velvet- 

 lite. The compound leaves are seldom six inches long, often not three, and they 

 are made up of from three to nine leaflets. The small seeds are equipped with wings. 

 The tree is small and would be without any commercial importance except that it 

 grows in -an arid region where any wood is welcome. It is made into ax, hammer, 

 and pick handles, and wagon makers are often glad to get it. It is found among the 

 mountains and canyons of western Texas, in New Mexico, Arizona, southern Nevada, 

 and southeastern California, near the shores of Owen's lake. The largest trees are 

 scarcely forty feet high and eight inches in diameter. The wood is not hard or 

 strong, and is of slow growth. The largest trunks are apt to be hollow. Sapwood 

 is comparatively thick. 



BERLANDIER ASH (Fraxinus berlandieriana) may not be entitled to a place 

 among native species of the United States. Some suppose it was introduced from 

 Mexico by early Spanish settlers in western Texas. It now grows wild there along 

 Nueces and Blanco rivers where specimens thirty feet high and a foot in diameter are 

 found. Southward in Mexico it is a popular street tree, and trunks reach six or eight 

 feet in diameter. The wood is soft and is used only locally and in very small quan- 

 tities. 



