10 TREE PLANTER'S MANUAL. 



some of these species branch out from near the ground, towering up in 

 grand balance, forming large, round heads, the tips of the branches droop- 

 ing somewhat like the weeping willow. The shade of this species, when 

 the tree is matured, covers a large area, the branches being so freely yet 

 connectedly spread out umbrella shape. 



Another conspicuous type is characterized by a single straight trunk, 

 crowned with a smaller and flatter head, and with less shade. It branches 

 higher up from the ground than the former, self-pruned, leaving a long 

 solid trunk, thirty, forty, and even fifty feet, in some cases, free from limbs 

 save now and then abortive branchlets, which in time scale of. As a rule 

 this tree seldom needs any pruning. 



Leaves short-stalked, oval, taper pointed. Flowers in April, purplish, 

 clustered. Fruit flat, fringed with a dense down. Easily grown. Matures 

 in June. Then plant it in thin light loam. No tree should be planted 

 more extensively. It belongs to the centuries. 



Generally, this elm is hard to split; hence its wood is very useful for 

 wheels, saddle-trees, special kinds of coopering, for keels to small boats, 

 and some other mechanical structures. Quite substantial rope can be 

 made from its macerated bark. When sawed quartering, polished and 

 varnished, it is, in some instances, as beautiful as the black walnut or 

 bird's-eye maple. 



SLIPPERY ELM, UlmUS fulVd. 



Also known as the Red and Mdose Elm, and by the American French as 

 the Anne gras. This tree does not grow to the size of the White Elm, nor 

 is it as common. It thrives in a well drained soil, while that variety of the 

 white called the water elm, prefers a low, alluvial soil. In favorable 

 localities of our state it attains fifteen to twenty inches in diameter and 

 from fifty to sixty feet in height. It can be readily distinguished in winter 

 from the white by the buds, which are rounder and larger, and in their 

 early development by being covered by a russet down. Its leaves are also 

 larger, thicker and rougher. "These and the flowers," says Gray, "are 

 sweet seented in drying." The flowers are grouped at the extremity of the 

 young shoots. "Seed in the middle of the orbicular or round oval fruit, 

 far away from the shallow notch." The trunk-bark is brown, hart of a 

 aull red tinge. The wood appears a perfect make-up and very beautiful 

 when well polished and varnished. When exposed to the weather it is of a 

 better quality and more durable than the White Elm. It is valuable for 

 blocks, ox-yokes, etc. "Well known for its mucilaginous, medicinal inner 

 bark." As an ornamental tree it is not as gracefully balanced as the 

 white elm, but for utility it should be extensively planted and carefully 

 preserved in our woodlands and cultivated groves. 



cork elm, Ulmus racemosa. 



The other names for this tree are the White Corky and Rock Elm. For 

 wheelwright, furniture, and other purposes, it is the most valuable of all 

 the elms; its wood is drier, whiter, cleaner rifted, and finer in constituency. 

 It extends north on the higher shores of the upper Mississippi and its 



