SYCAMORE 



(Platanus Occidentalis) 



TJROBABLY no person with a practical knowledge of trees ever 

 A mistakes sycamore for anything else. The tree stands clear-cut 

 and distinct. Until the trunk becomes old, it sheds its outer layer of 

 bark yearly, or at least frequently, and the exfoliation exposes the white, 

 new bark below. The upper part of the trunk and the large branches 

 are white and conspicuous in the spring, and are recognizable at a long 

 distance. No other tree in the American forest is as white. The nearest 

 approach to it is the paper birch of the North, or the white birch of New 

 England. 



Notwithstanding the tree's individuality, it has a good many 

 names. It is generally known as sycamore throughout the states of the 

 Union, but it is frequently called buttonwood in Vermont, New Hamp- 

 shire, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Pennsyl- 

 vania, Delaware, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, 

 Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Nebraska, Michigan, Minnesota, 

 Ohio, and Ontario; buttonball tree in several of the eastern states and 

 occasionally in Illinois, Iowa, Ohio, Michigan, and Nebraska; the plane 

 tree in Rhode Island, Delaware, South Carolina, Kansas, Nebraska, and 

 Iowa; the water beech in Delaware; the platane, cottonier, and bois 

 puant in Louisiana. Probably the finest growth of the sycamore ever 

 encountered was in Ohio and Indiana, and these states still contain iso- 

 lated patches of magnificent specimens of the wood. The Black 

 Swamp of Ohio was originally a famous sycamore country, of which 

 Defiance was the center of lumber manufacture. Many parts of Indiana 

 produced a good sycamore growth, and a considerable amount of timber 

 of excellent quality still exists, but is now largely owned by farmers 

 who are generally holding it out of the market. 



The range of sycamore extends from Maine to Nebraska, and south 

 to Texas and Florida. It is one of the largest of American hardwoods, 

 and in diameter of trunk it is exceeded by none. Trees are on record 

 that were from ten to fourteen feet in diameter, and it was not unusual in 

 the primeval forests for them to tower nearly or quite 125. In height a 

 number of hardwoods exceed it, the yellow poplar in particular ; but 

 none of them has a larger trunk than the largest sycamores. However, 

 the mammoths are generally hollow. The heart decays as rings of new 

 growth are added to the outside of the shell. So large were the cavities 

 in some of the sycamores in the original forests that more than one case is 

 on record of their being used by early settlers as places of abode. 



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