

PINACE.E %\ 



thickened on the inner rim, obliquely rounded at the broad apex and about T length of 

 nuts. 



A tree, usually 40-50 but occasionally 80 high, with a trunk 3-4 in diameter, divided 

 generally lo-20 above the ground into 3 or 4 thick secondary stems, clothed with short 

 crooked branches pendant below and ascending toward the summit of the tree, and forming 

 an open round-topped head remarkable for the sparseness of its foliage, and stout pale 

 glaucous branchlets, becoming dark brown or nearly black during their second season. 

 Bark of the trunk l'-2' thick, dark brown slightly tinged with red or nearly black and 

 deeply and irregularly divided into thick connected ridges covered with small closely ap- 

 pressed scales. Wood light, soft, not strong, close-grained, brittle, light brown or red 

 with thick nearly white sapwood. Abietine, a nearly colorless aromatic liquid with the 

 odor of oil of oranges, is obtained by distilling the resinous juices. The large sweet slightly 

 resinous seeds formed an important article of food for the Indians of California. 



Distribution. Scattered singly or in small groups over the dry foothills of western Cali- 

 fornia, ranging from 500 up to 4000 above the sea-level and from the southern slopes of 

 the northern cross ranges to the Tehachapi Mountains and the Sierra de la Liebre; most 

 abundant and attaining its largest size on the eastern foothills of the Sierra Nevada near 

 the centre of the state at elevations of about 2000; here often the most conspicuous feature 

 of the vegetation. 



18. Pinus Coulter! D. Don. Pitch Pine. 



Leaves tufted at the ends of the branches, stout, rigid, dark blue-green, marked by 

 numerous bands of stomata on the 3 faces, 6'-12' long, deciduous during their third and 



Fig. 24 



fourth seasons.- Flowers: male yellow; female dark reddish brown. Fruit oblong-conic, 

 short-stalked and pendant, 10'-14' long, becoming light yellow-brown, with thick broad 

 scales terminating in a broad, flat, incurved, hooked claw %'-\\' long, gradually opening in 

 the autumn and often persistent on the branches for several years; seeds ellipsoidal, com- 

 pressed, \' long, Y~ wide, dark chestnut-brown, with a thick shell, inclosed by their wings, 

 broadest above the middle, oblique at apex, nearly 1' longer than the seed, about f ' wide. 

 A tree, 40-90 high, with a trunk 1-2| in diameter, thick branches covered with dark 

 scaly bark, long and mostly pendulous below, short and ascending above, and forming a 

 loose unsymmetrical often picturesque head, and very stout branchlets dark orange-brown 

 at first, becoming sometimes nearly black at the end of three or four years. Bark of the 



