TIIE SUlVLVCnS 139 



when mature, often nearly white on the under surface, 

 these leaves turn in autumn to bright scarlet, shading into 

 purple, crimson, and orange. No sunset was ever more 

 changeful and glorious than a patch of staghorn sumach 

 that covers the ugliness of a railroad siding in October. 

 After the leaves have fallen, the dull red fuzzy fruits per- 

 sist, offering food to belated bird migrants and gradually 

 fading to browns before spring. 



The maximum height of this largest of northern 

 sumachs is thirty -five feet. The wood of such large speci- 

 mens is sometimes used for walking-sticks and for tabou- 

 rets and such fancy work as inlaying. Coarse, soft, and 

 brittle, it is satiny when pohshed, and attractively streaked 

 w^th orange and green. The young shoots are cut and 

 their pith contents removed to make pipes for drawing 

 maple sap from the trees in sugaring time. 



But the best use of the tree is for ornamental planting. 

 In summer, the ughness of the most unsightly bank is 

 covered where this tree is allowed to run wild and throw up 

 its root suckers unchecked. The mass effect of its fern- 

 like fohage in spring is superb, when the green is lightened 

 by the fine clusters of pink blossoms. No tree carries its 

 autumn foliage longer nor blazes with greater splendor in 

 the soft sunshine of the late year. The hairy staghorn 

 branches, bared of leaves, hold aloft their fruits like lighted 

 candelabra far into the waning winter. For screens and 

 border shrubs this sumach may become objectionable, 

 by reason of its habit of spreading by suckers as well as 

 seed. 



Its choice of situations is broken uplands and dry, 

 gravelly banks. Its range extends from New Brunswick 

 to Minuesotxi and southward through the Northern states,- 



