272 FOEEST TREES OF THE PACIFIC SLOPE. 



inch long and about three-eighths to seven-sixteenths of an inch through, have 

 scales with blunt thick ends and minute gauze-winged seeds (fig. 120, a). The 

 thin seed-wing is a very distinctive character. 



Wood : Nothing is known of the characteristics of the wood, which is prob- 

 ably very much like that of the mountain alder (Ahius tenuifolia) ; not known 

 to have any economic use. but, when large enough, suitable for charcoal and 

 fuel. The tree is useful as a forest cover for its firm thickets, which protect 

 lower mountain stream and springy slopes at lower elevations than those at 

 which the mouutaiu alder grows. 



Longevity. — No records of age are available. 



RANGE. 



Northwest coast from Alaska to Oregon and to west slopes of Rockies in Alberta and 

 Montana. From sea-level to 3,000 and 4,000 feet (timber line) in Alaska, and chiefly 

 above 3,000 feet in British Columbia and United States. Of tree size mainly in Alaska. 

 Range imperfectly known. 



OCCURRENCE. 



In moist bottoms, lower courses of mountain streams, and marshy flats, in humus- 

 covered, rich, rocky, or gravelly soils. Forms pure stands over limited areas, or mingled 

 ■with willows (at north), occasionally with western red cedar and broadleaf maple. 



Climatic Conditions. — Similar in part to those of western red cedar. 



Tolerance. — Endures considerable shade, especially in early life, but requires over- 

 head light in later stages. Seeding habits and reproduction undetermined. 



Family CUPTJLIFERa:. 



A very important family of most useful hardwood timber trees, which includes 

 chestnuts, beeches, hornbeams, and oaks. A characteristic of their fruits, 

 which are nuts, is that they are wholly or partly inclosed by a usually woody, 

 separable covering, as in the prickly "burs'" of chestnuts and beeches and the 

 scaly or bristly cups of acorns. Flowers, male and female, are each borne 

 on different parts of the same tree, often on different parts of the same 

 branch, usually greenish or yellowish, and, with one or two exceptions, incon- 

 spicuous and unlike in appearance the showy flowers of cherries, magnolias, 

 and many other groups of broadleaf trees. The fruits of some members ripen 

 in a single season, while those of others require two seasons to complete their 

 development. Fruits of all are heavy, falling only beneath the mother trees 

 and depending for their distribution upon flood waters and streams, or upon 

 birds and mammals which carry or store them away for food, and thus, when 

 they do not eat them, help to spread and propagate them. The leaves, mostly 

 shed in the autumn of each year, but evergreen in one division of the family, 

 are produced singly, never in pairs. 



CASTAN0PSIS. CHINQUAPINS. 



Members of the chinquapin group, as the name indicates, are chestnut-like 

 in some of their characters, and are closely related to the chestnuts on one side 

 and to the oaks on the other. Some of them have hard, heavy, strong wood, 

 while others produce lighter and softer, brittle wood, unlike that of either 

 chestnut or oak in appearance, but like that of both in containing tannin. The 

 bark also contains tannin. Smooth twigs with scaly buds. They are character- 

 ized by their thick, evergreen leaves and (in our species) by their prickly fruit 

 burs, which, though smaller outwardly resemble somewhat the burs of the 

 common chestnut. The fruit (burs) require two seasons in which to mature 



