150 



TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



and lustrous in their first season, becoming darker and more or less tinged with red the 

 following year; usually smaller and shrubby in habit. Winter-buds narrowly ovoid, acute, 

 light orange-brown, lustrous, about ' long. Bark thin, smooth, dark brown slightly 

 tinged with red. 



Distribution. Banks of streams and swamps; Newfoundland to the shores of Hudson's 

 Bay and northwestward to the valley of the Mackenzie River and the eastern base of the 

 Rocky Mountains, southward to southern Pennsylvania, northeastern Iowa, the Turtle 

 Mountains, North Dakota, and eastern Nebraska; very abundant at the north, rare south- 

 ward; a variety from extreme northeastern New England and adjacent New Brunswick and 

 Quebec (var. intonsa Fernald) is distinguished by its often linear leaves rufous pubescent 

 during the season on the under side of the veins and by its pubescent branchlets; a shrub 

 or tree up to 25. 



10. Salix taxifolia H. B. K. 



Leaves linear-lanceolate, narrowed at the ends, acute, slightly falcate, mucronate at the 

 apex, entire or rarely obscurely dentate above the middle, coated as they unfold with long 



Fig. 144 



soft white hairs, at maturity pale gray-green, slightly puberulous, I'-H' long, rV'-l' wide, 

 with a slender midrib, thin arcuate veins, and thickened slightly re volute margins; petioles 

 stout, puberulous, rarely yV long; stipules ovate, acute, scarious, minute, caducous. Flow- 

 ers: aments densely flowered, oblong-cylindric or subglobose, \'-\' long, terminal, or ter- 

 minal and axillary on the staminate plant, on short leafy branchlets; scales oblong or 

 obovate, rounded or acute and sometimes apiculate at apex, coated on the outer surface 

 with hoary tomentum and pubescent or glabrous on the inner; stamens 2, with free fila- 

 ments hairy below the middle; ovary ovoid-conic, short-stalked or subsessile, villose, with 

 nearly sessile deeply emarginate stigmas. Fruit cylindric, long-pointed, bright red-brown, 

 more or less villose, short-stalked, about \' long. 



A tree, often 40-50 high, with a trunk 18' in diameter, erect and drooping branches 

 forming a broad open head, and slender branchlets covered during their first season with 

 hoary tomentum, becoming light reddish or purplish brown and much roughened by the 

 elevated persistent leaf-scars. Winter-buds ovoid, acute, dark chestnut-brown, puberu- 

 lous, about TS' long and nearly as broad as long. Bark of the trunk f '-!' thick, light gray- 

 brown, and divided by deep fissures into broad flat ridges covered by minute closely ap- 

 pressed scales. 



Distribution. Near El Paso, Texas; southwestern New Mexico, and along mountain 



