A search for two of America's rarest conifers 

 Walter C. and George Q. Shepard 



The family called TAXACEAE, or yew family, contains 

 about twelve genera and nearly 100 species, yet only five spe- 

 cies are indigenous to the United States. Of these five species, 

 two are native to the Pacific coast region; one, Taxus canaden- 

 sis, is found in the Northeast; while the other two, Taxus 

 floridana and Tumion taxifolium, much rarer and more local- 

 ized in their distribution, are found along the east side of the 

 Apalachicola River, in Florida. 



Check-lists and works on the distribution of conifers give 

 little specific information as to the location of these rare trees. 

 For instance, files in the U. S. Department of Agriculture at 

 Washington still state that Taxus floridana is found from "Aspa- 

 laga to the vicinity of Bristol"; yet Aspalaga, which appears 

 once to have been a more or less flourishing bluff-settlement 

 and boasted a ferry across the river, has been entirely off the 

 map for some twenty-five years and is today nothing more than 

 a memory. Indeed, even if it were possible to state the exact 

 locations of the various groups of these trees, the locations 

 would be untenable for very long. Botanists have been exploit- 

 ing them on a small scale, but the chief exploitation has been 

 in the hands of manufacturers of bows and arrows. The wood 

 of this tree is smooth, close-grained, hard, flexible and durable, 

 and is therefore ideal for making bows. 



Tumion taxifolium , which is the more common of these two 

 conifers, is not so difficult to find since its range is longer and 

 more continuous than is that of Taxus floridana. In fact, there 

 is a group of the former which can be reached just off the Florida 

 State highway where it crosses the Apalachicola River at River 

 Junction; and its range extends over the State boundary into 

 Decatur County, Georgia. Taxus floridana, on the other hand, 

 is now almost extinct in its native habitat and is known to be 

 growing in only a few isolated places within its limited range. 



Inquiries revealed to the authors the location of one or two 

 scattered groups of yew, but it was from Mr. D. H. Ward of 

 Bristol, County Agent of Liberty County, that we managed to 

 locate a grove where both yew and tumion were growing to- 



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