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white. The distal part of the year-shoot dies before the next 
vegetative period but persists as a point often thorny. The 
year-shoots may be branched and are often twice branched. 
The inflorescences are short racemes placed on branches of 
secondary order. Under unfavourable conditions, for instance 
on rocky ground, no long-shoots are formed but only short- 
shoots. (A. compacta). 
The white or reddish flowers appear in April or May. 
The fruit is a nut enclosed in the three-winged perianth. 
Salsola Arbuscula Pall. 
A characteristic and very variable plant. Its varied 
aspect was described and illustrated so long ago as 1833 by 
EıcnwaLpt. On clay it is a stunted, twiggy, stiff shrub with 
short shoots and hard stiff leaves. But where it occurs on 
moving-sand it may become a small tree with long pliant 
shoots and leaves. In the sand-desert it varies in pliancy 
and hardness, in length of shoots, and in hairiness of shoots 
and leaves. It has very long roots which in the dune-valleys 
may be seen exposed and stretching from dune to dune, 
thus showing that some at least are horizontal. 
The best developed form (var. angustifolia Fzl.) will be 
considered first (fig. 12.) As a tree it attains a height of 3—5 
metres, with foliage greener and denser than that of any 
other desert-plant in these parts; the stem is light-coloured 
and elegant. It appears thus on the moving-sand, and here 
also may be found specimens with fasciated branches, a 
character which often accompanies luxuriant growth. 
Salsola Arbuscula is one of the most important plants 
for sand-binding purposes along the Transcaspian railroads. 
Small pieces of the stem are stuck into the sand and of 
these 100 per ci. germinate, but many of them are injured 
by lepidopterous larve. In the course of two years the 
plants attain a height of about 3 metres. The hardihood of 
the plant in withstanding sand-drift has already been con- 
sidered (p. 88). 
In vigorous specimens from the sand-desert the leaves are 
7 centimetres long or rather longer. They are cylindrical 
13 
