40 BULLETIN 327, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



trees (30 to 50 years old and as many feet high) have narrow, cylin- 

 drical, sharp-pointed crowns, extending down to the ground. All 

 of the regular groups of branches, except the topmost, sweep down 

 and upward at their ends in graceful curves, presenting a form which 

 is unsurpassed in beauty and symmetry by any of our other conifers. 



Tfce sharp-pointed winter buds are light chocolate-brown and 

 about one-fourth of an inch long. Unlike the winter buds of other 

 firs of this region, those of the Shasta fir are not resinous. 



The dense foliage is dark blue-green, with a whitish tinge; new 

 leaves, produced each season, are at first a much lighter green and 

 more conspicuously whitened than when older. The leaves are four- 

 angled, with nearly equal sides, the angle on the upper sides of the 

 leaves being rounded. Leaves of the lower branches (PL XXV, &) 

 are flatter than those on other parts of the crown (PI. XXV, a). 

 Those on the lower side of the branches are so bent that they appear 

 to grow from the top side of the branch, and mainly in two dense 

 upright lines. All of the leaves are, however, more or less curved. 

 The leaves of lower branches are from three-fourths of an inch to 

 about 1£ inches long, blunt or rounded at the end, and wider there 

 than at the base. Leaves of the upper-crown branches (PI. XXV, a) 

 are more strongly four-sided and stouter than those of lower branches 

 and are conspicuously curved and densely crowded toward and on 

 the top of the branches. They are from five-eighths of an inch to 

 about 1-J inches long and more or less distinctly pointed ; leaves of the 

 leader are also somewhat sharply pointed and incurved to the stem. 



The cones (PI. XXV, a) are mature by the middle or end of 

 August, and during September they break up and liberate the seeds 

 (PL XXV, c). At maturity they are deep purple in color and often 

 tinged with brown. They vary in length from about 4| to 5^ inches 

 by about 2^ to 3 inches in diameter and in form from cylindrical to a 

 long egg shape. The bracts, attached to the backs of the cone scales, are 

 always broad at the end and in some cases scarcely or only slightly 

 extended beyond the ends of the cone scales (PL XXV, a), while in 

 others the bracts may be conspicuously extended (PL XXV, d). 1 

 The large- winged seeds (PL XXV, c) are dark brown, with shiny, 

 purplish or rose-colored wings. The seed-leaves vary from 9 to 13, 

 but are usually 12, and are about five j eighths of an inch long and 

 bluntly pointed. 



1 Shasta red fir trees have been found bearing some cones with plainly exserted bracts and 

 others with bracts entirely hidden. The hidden and exserted bracts do not differ essen- 

 tially in form. In 1899 the writer found a group of trees at "Alta Meadows" (Sequoia"" 

 National Park, Cal.), on some of which all of the cones bore exserted bracts, while on 

 other trees the. cones bore only hidden bracts. * There is a sharp distinction between the 

 form of the bract produced by Abies magnifica and its variety shastensis, bracts of the 

 latter being broadly rounded at the end (PI, XXV, d) and bracts of the species being 

 narrowly lance pointed (PI. XXV, e). No forms of bracts strictly intermediate between 

 these extreme types have as yet been discovered. 



