PINE FAMILY 



rarely of four, slender, dark blue green, serrulate, acute, with 

 callous tips, soft, three to five inches long ; fibro-vascular bundles 

 two. Sheaths thin, silvery white at first, later become dark grayish 

 brown. Persist from two to five years. 



Flowers. — Staminate flowers in short crowded clusters, near the 

 tip of the growing shoots, oblong-cylindrical, three-quarters of an 

 inch long ; anthers pale purple with orbicular, slightly denticulate 

 crests ; involucral bracts eight to ten. Pistillate flowers in clusters 

 of two, three or four, subterminal, oblong or subglobose, one-third 

 of an inch long ; scales ovate, rose pink, with slender tips ; bracts 

 nearly orbicular. 



Cones. — Lateral, very abundant, ovate or oblong-conical, one and 

 a half to two and a half inches long, persist several years. Scales 

 nearly flat, obtuse, thickened at apex, marked with a prominent 

 transverse ridge, armed with small, slender, nearly straight, de- 

 ciduous prickles. Seeds triangular, brown, mottled with black ; 

 wings broadest at the middle, thin, pale brown, one-half an inch 

 long. 



GRAY PINE. JACK PINE. SCRUB PINE 



Plniis divaricata. 



Frequently seventy feet high with straight branchless trunk, long 

 spreading branches forming an open symmetrical head ; often much 

 shorter and sometimes shrubby. Fruits when very young. A north- 

 ern tree, ranging from Nova Scotia southward to Maine, New Hamp- 

 shire, and Vermont, westward to northern Indiana and Illinois, and 

 in the northwest to the valley of the Mackenzie River, where it is 



the only pine tree. In sandy soil, sometimes 



forming exclusive forests. 



Bark. — Dark brown with reddish tinge, with 

 shallow rounded ridges separating into small ap- 

 pressed scales. Branchlets slender, tough, flex- 

 ible, pale yellow green, becoming dark reddish 

 purple and later dark purplish brown. 



Wood. — Pale brown, rarely yellow, sapwood 

 nearly white ; light, soft, not strong, close- 

 grained. Used for fuel, railway ties, and posts. 

 Indians prefer it for frames of canoes. 



Bjids. — Branch-buds ovate with rounded apex, 

 terminal bud one-fourth of an inch long, as long 

 again as the lateral buds. Covered with ovate- 

 lanceolate pale brown scales with spreading tips, whose bases 

 persist after the body of the scale has fallen and roughen the 

 branch. 



Gray Pine, Piniis di- 

 varicata. Leaves 

 i' to 2}^' long. 



460 



