SALICACE.E 141 



A tree, usually 30-40 high, with usually several clustered stout stems, thick spreading 

 upright branches forming a broad somewhat irregular open head, and reddish brown or 

 gray-brown branchlets pubescent when they first appear, soon glabrous, and easily separated 

 at the joints. Winter-buds acute, about ' long. Bark I'-l^' thick, dark brown or 

 nearly black and deeply divided into broad flat connected ridges separating freely into 





Fig. 133 



thick plate-like scales and becoming shaggy on old trunks. Wood light, soft, weak, light 

 reddish brown, with thin nearly white sapwood ; now sawed into lumber in the valley of 

 the lower Mississippi River and largely used for packing cases, cellar and barn floors, in 

 furniture, and in the manufacture of toys and other purposes where strength is not im- 

 portant as it does not warp, check or splinter. 



Distribution. Low moist alluvial banks of streams and lakes ; southern New Brunswick 

 through southern Quebec and Ontario to the region north of Lake Superior, southward to 

 northern and western North Carolina, through the Piedmont region of South Carolina and 

 Georgia to eastern and central Alabama, and westward to southeastern North Dakota, 

 eastern South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, the valley of Wichita River, Oklahoma, and 

 central and western Texas to Valverde County. 



In southern Arkansas, in Louisiana and in eastern Texas Salix nigra is often replaced by 

 var. altissima Sarg., differing from the type in the more pubescent young branchlets, leaves 

 and petioles, in the more acute base of the leaves and longer petioles, and in its later 

 flowering. A tree sometimes 120 feet high and the tallest of American Willows. 



Salix nigra var. Lindheimeri Schn. 



Salix Wrightii Sarg. not Anders. 



Leaves lanceolate, often slightly falcate, long-pointed and acuminate at apex, cuneate 

 at base, finely glandular-serrate, glabrous, light green on the upper surface, paler below, 

 4 '-5' long, \'-% wide; petioles pubescent early in the season, becoming glabrous, ^' |' in 

 length. Flowers: aments slender, densely villose, 2'-3' long; scales ovate, acute or rarely 

 rounded at apex, covered with matted white hairs, more abundant on the inner surface; 

 stamens 4 or 5; filaments villose below the middle; ovary ovoid, gradually narrowed to the 

 apex, the 2-lobed stigmas nearly sessile. Fruit ovoid-conic; pedicels about i' long. 



Atree,50-70,high with a trunk often 3 in diameter, large erect spreading branches 

 forming an open irregular head, and slender branchlets light green and slightly pubescent 



