PINACEAE. PICEA BICOLOR 43 



with Larix Kaempferi Sarg., Pinus koraiensis S. & Z. and P. parviflora S. & Z., al- 

 though I did not see it on this mountain. It grows on Shirane-san in Kai province 

 and Sargent collected it on the Wada-toge in Shinano province. I have also a 

 specimen collected for me on Sangai-san near Ena-san in Mino province, and Mayr 

 collected it on the Chichibu Mountains in Musashi province. From this evidence 

 it is clear that this Spruce grows on many of the high mountains in central 

 Hondo, but apparently it is nowhere common. In a list of the conifers which 

 grow on the southern island of Kyushu, compiled for me from the forestry records 

 by Mr. T. Miyoshi of the Government Forestry service and stationed at Kago- 

 shima, P. bicolor is reported from four localities in Bungo province, from two in 

 Higo province and from one in Osumi province. I have seen, however, no speci- 

 mens from any of these localities and suspect that in some cases at least the Spruce 

 reported is P. jezoensis Carr. From Nantai-san in the Nikko region Shirasawa 

 reports P. bicolor, but I did not see it on that mountain nor in that region. 



As I saw it growing on the volcanic soil and wind-swept slopes of Fuji-san, P. 

 bicolor was not a handsome or attractive tree, but in sheltered woods I met with 

 a few young trees of good appearance. The bark is gray, usually pale gray, but 

 sometimes gray-brown, fissured and broken into small, thin, scale-like flakes of 

 irregular size, which on old trees are more or less firmly coherent. The branches are 

 rather slender, spread horizontally, are often slightly ascending and form a rather 

 broad pyramidal crown; the shoots vary in color from shining yellowish brown to 

 reddish brown and change to gray the second, third or fourth year. On young 

 trees the shoots may all be quite glabrous, but on adult trees usually the principal 

 shoots are pubescent and the weak lateral shoots glabrous, but often on fruiting 

 branches all the shoots are more or less hairy. The pubescence is short and gray, 

 and is confined to the furrows between the pulvini or clothes the whole shoot 

 and even occurs on the margin of the basal part of the leaf itself. The winter-buds 

 are dull-brown to chestnut-brown, ovoid to conical, obtuse or somewhat acute and 

 usually slightly resinous; the scales are firmly appressed and often slightly sca- 

 rious on the margin. The leaves are more or less bluish green, sometimes glaucous, 

 from 1 to % cm. long, mostly curved, rhombic in section, with lines of stomata on 

 all four surfaces; on erect and main shoots they are appressed to the twig on all 

 sides and point forward, but on the lateral shoots the arrangement is more or less 

 pectinate and the under side of the twig is exposed. On young trees the leaves are 

 pungent and on fruiting branches and adult trees they are oblique at the apex 

 which ends in a short cartilaginous point. The cone is ovoid-cylindrical to cylin- 

 drical, from 6 to 12 cm. (usually from 7 to 10 cm.) long, pale reddish purple when 

 growing, changing to cinnamon-brown when ripe and becoming shining or dull 

 mud-brown when old. The cone-scales vary from obovate to rhombic and are ap- 

 pressed or more or less reflexed at the apex, which is broad and rounded or 

 narrowed, denticulate, often finely so, and occasionally erose. The wood is white, 

 somewhat lustrous and of the same quality as that of P. jezoensis Carr., but the 

 tree is too scarce to be of economic importance. 



Shirasawa and Koyama have described two varieties of the Spruce based 

 largely upon the character of the cone-scales. The differences are very slight and 

 have been observed on cultivated trees in this country and in Europe, but I do 

 not think they have taxonomic value. The cone-scales of P. Abies Karst. are 

 notoriously variable in shape; other species, too, exhibit similar variation, and 

 it would appear that a tendency toward rhombic cone-scales is inherent in most 

 species of Picea. 



