370 NEW ENGLAND TREES IN WINTER. 



BALSAM FIR 

 Balsam, Fir, Balm of Gilead Fir. 



Abies balsamea (L.) Mill. 



HABIT A medium sized tree, 25-60 ft. in height with a trunk diameter 

 of 1-2 ft., becoming a shrub toward the tops of high mountains; 

 branches usually arising in distinct whorls and throughout horizontal, 

 ascending or declining, or declining toward the base horizontal in the 

 middle and ascending toward the top of the tree forming a symmetrical 

 broad-based conical head. A rapidly growing comparatively short-lived 

 tree losing its lower branches at an early period. 



BARK Grayish-brown, smooth with raised blisters containing a 

 fragrant oily resin; in old trees becoming somewhat roughened with 

 small scales at base of trunk. 



TWIGS Grayish and more or less downy, becoming with age grayish- 

 brown and smooth, branchlets mostly opposite arising at a wide angle. 

 Photograph of twig is about V 3 natural size. 



LEAVES Scattered, on young trees and sterile twigs generally 

 twisting so as to appear 2-ranked as in the Hemlock, on upper fruiting 

 branches and leading shoots generally covering the upper side of the 

 twigs; dark green and shining on upper side, pale below with grayish 

 lines of minute dots, flattened, generally blunt about % inch or more 

 long, slightly narrowed at base but not stalked, arising at about a 

 right angle to the twig, leaving after falling a flat, round scar, 

 fragrant, aromatic when crushed. MICROSCOPIC SECTION showing 2 

 fibre-vascular bundles closely adjacent and appearing as one in a knife 

 section, 2 resin-ducts between the bundles and the epidemis with 

 stoma.ta chiefly on the under side. 



BUDS Small, broadly ovate to spherical, generally less than 5 mm. 

 long, closely grouped at tips of main twigs; bud-scales varnished and 

 glued together by resinous coating. 



FRUIT Erect cones ripening in the autumn of the first season. 

 SCALES falling and leaving only the erect central axes to which they 

 were attached persistent through winter. 



COMPARISONS The Balsam Fir is distinguished from our native 

 New England evergreens by its smooth blistery bark and by its leaves 

 which are attached directly to the twig and leave a round, flat scar on 

 falling. From the Hemlock it is further distinguished by the absence 

 of leaf stalks and from the Spruce by the flattened apparently 2-ranked 

 leaves. See under Douglas Fir for Comparisons with this species. 



DISTRIBUTION Rich, damp, cool woods, deep swamps, mountain 

 slopes. Occasionally cultivated as an ornamental tree. Labrador, New- 

 foundland, and Nova Scotia, northwest to the Great Bear Lake region; 

 south to Pennsylvania and along high mountains to Virginia; west to 

 Minnesota. 



IN NEW ENGLAND Maine very generally distributed, ordinarily 

 associated with White Pine, Black Spruce, Red Spruce, and a few 

 deciduous trees, growing at an altitude of 4,500 feet upon Katahdin; 

 New Hampshire common in upper Coos county and in the White 

 Mountains, where it climbs up to the alpine area; in the southern part 

 of the state, in the extensive swamps around the sources of the Con- 

 toocook and Miller's rivers it is the prevailing timber; Vermont 

 common; not rare on mountain slopes and even summits; Massachusetts 

 not uncommon on mountain slopes in the northwestern and central 

 portions of the state, ranging above the Red Spruces upon Graylock; 

 a few trees here and there in damp woods or cold swamps in the 

 southern and eastern sections, where it has probably been accidentally 

 introduced; Rhode Island not reported. 



IN CONNECTICUT Rare. Cold swamps and woods. Middlebury, 

 Goshen, Cornwall, Salisbury. Also occurs as an escape from cultivation 

 at Woodstock, Andover and Farmington. 



WOOD Light, soft, not strong, coarse-grained, perishable, pale brown, 

 streaked with yellow, with thick lighter colored sapwood, occasionally 

 made into lumber, principally used for packing cases, used largely in 

 manufacture of wood pulp. From the blisters in the bark Canada 

 balsam is obtained which is used in medicine and as a medium for 

 mounting microscopic preparations. The fragrant leaves and small 

 twigs are used to stuff balsam or so-called "pine"-pillows. 



