MORPHOLOGICAL INSTABILITY, ESPECIALLY IN 
PINUS RADIATA . 
Francis E. LLoyp : 
(WITH TWO FIGURES AND PLATE XIV) 
The various behaviors of the vegetative and reproductive shoots 
in the Coniferae have for many years been the objects of extended 
observation and experiment, and these have been the basis of a 
massive literature. From this we may derive no mean conception 
of the amount of morphological instability which characterizes that 
genus which, in some regards at least, is the most highly specialized 
of all, namely Pinus. Of the conditions which discover such 
instability, injury has been the most efficient, the resulting unusual 
developments being said to be due to disturbed nutrition, especially 
over-nutrition. Precisely what is meant by this is not and cannot 
at present be stated, so that any light which experiment or the — 
diversity of behavior in nature may afford us should be welcomed, 
especially if it may lead to a more specific indication of the most 
potent of the causes which must always be at play. 
Evidence of such specific value is given us by the Monterey pine 
(Pinus radiata), a species as definitely restricted to a small area 
as the famous Monterey cypress (Cupressus macrocarpa), & e0- 
graphical neighbor. The center of this area is, as nearly as may 
be, at Carmel-by-the-Sea, where is stationed a laboratory of the 
Carnegie Institution of Washington. The detailed descriptions of 
California trees in Jepson’s Silva of California render minutiae 
unnecessary, though it may be noted in passing that among the 
teratological observations no mention is made in this work of the 
peculiarities to be noted below. 
Carmel is situated in a forest of Pinus radiata, not, howevel, 
to the advantage of the tree. It is becoming more and more ae 
come by borers and fungi. It is, in any event, a short-lived tree ° 
small dimensions but very rapid growth, a fact of importance . 
the present connection. It grows readily under cultivation, a6 
Botanical Gazette, vol. 57] [34 
