May 27, 1891.] 



Garden and Forest. 



241 



GARDEN AND FOREST 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office : Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by Professor C. S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER AT THE POST OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, MAY 27, 1891. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Editorial Articles: — The Swamp White Oak. (With figure.) 241 



The Western Arbor- vitas Destined to Disappear 242 



Ivy in an Old French Garden Mrs. Schuyler Van Rensselaer. 242 



Native Shrubs of California. — V Professor Edward L. Greene. 243 



An Oak Scale. (With figure.) Professor Jolm B. Smith. 243 



How We Renewed an Old Place. — VII Mrs. J. PI. RobUns. 243 



New or Little Known Plants : — New Orchids R. A. Rolfe. 244 



Recent Plant Portraits 245 



Foreign Correspondence : — London Letter Visitor. 245 



Cultural Department : — The Abuse of Insecticides T. H. Hoskins, M.D. 247 



The Influence of Stock upon Cion C. W. Mathews. 247 



Lima Beans Professor IV. F. Massey . 248 



Spring Garden Notes E. O. Orf>et. 248 



Musas W. H. Taplin. 248 



Gypsophila paniculata, Iris pumila alba J. N. G. 249 



Salsify, Tuberous Begonias, Amaryllis Professor W. F. Massey. 249 



The Forest :— Redwood Timber. — II Carl Purdy. 249 



Correspondence : — Are Plums and Cherries of one Genus? 



Professor Edward L. Greene. 250 



Southern Mississippi Floral Notes Professor Byron D. Hoisted. 250 



How Dandelions Escape the Lawn-mower H. 251 



Recent Publications 251 



Notes 252 



Illustrations : — An Oak Scale, Fig. 43 243 



A Young Swamp White Oak (Quercus bicolor) in Winter, Fig. 44 246 



The Swamp White Oak. 



IN eastern North America there is a peculiar group of 

 Oaks known generally as Chestnut Oaks on account 

 of the fancied resemblance of the leaves of one of their 

 number to those of the Chestnut-tree. They are White 

 Oaks, that is, they belong to the section of the genus in 

 which the fruit matures in one season ; and they all have 

 coarsely sinuately-lobed leaves, more or less pubescent 

 and white on the lower surface, and, with one exception, 

 pale, scaly bark. The exception is the Rock Chestnut 

 Oak, which grows on the dry banks of streams and in dry 

 upland forests ; on this tree the bark is deeply divided into 

 broad rounded ridges, and is dark-colored like the ordinary 

 bark of Black Oaks. The cup of the fruit of the Chestnut 

 Oak is hemispherical, usually hoary, and encloses nearly 

 one-half of the large oblong acorn, which is sweet and 

 more palatable than the fruit of other American Oaks. 



The upland Chestnut Oak was known to Linnaeus, who 

 called it Quercus Prinus ; the elder Michaux, who studied 

 our eastern Oaks conscientiously, and published, or, at 

 least, supplied, the material for an admirable book about 

 them, knew all the Chestnut Oaks. He considered them 

 forms of the Linnsean species, and in all the old works on 

 American trees they are spoken of as varieties of that 

 species. Two of the Chestnut Oaks grow in low, wet 

 situations, near the borders of swamps or pond-holes, and, 

 although they do not grow naturally in swamps, are usually 

 known as Swamp White Oaks. One of these trees belongs 

 to the north, where it is found from Canada to the Poto- 

 mac and along the mountains as far north as northern 

 Georgia, and from the Atlantic sea-coast to Iowa and 

 Missouri. This is the tree which botanists now generally 

 call Quercus bicolor ; it is represented or replaced in the 

 south by a larger and finer tree, one of the noblest and 

 most beautiful of the deciduous trees of eastern North 

 America, a second species of Swamp White Oak — the 

 Quercus Michauxii. This statement needs, perhaps, some 



qualification. Extreme forms of the northern, and of the 

 southern, Swamp Oaks are distinct enough, but in the 

 region where the two species mingle — in southern Dela- 

 ware and in Virginia — it is not so easy to distinguish them, 

 and one appears to pass gradually into the other. These 

 intermediate forms led Dr. Englemann, the most careful 

 student of American Oaks we have ever had, to believe 

 that the two trees should be regarded as varieties of one 

 species. But this is a subject which need not be discussed 

 at this time, our object now being to call attention to the 

 beauty and value of the northern tree as a good subject for 

 care when it is found growing naturally, or for cultivation 

 where proper conditions can be supplied for it. 



The Swamp White Oak in its young state, and until it 

 has reached the height of twenty or thirty feet, develops 

 short, rather stout, branches, which grow almost at right 

 angles with the stem, and form a narrow, formally pyra- 

 midal head ; as the individual grows older the formal 

 habit is generally lost, and an irregularly spreading top is 

 developed, which is broad or narrow, as it has abundant 

 or scanty room in which to enlarge. The lower branches, 

 in its youth at least, are remarkably persistent and generally 

 pendulous on this tree, or intricately contorted toward 

 their extremities. This habit is well shown in the portrait 

 (see page 246) of a tree thirty or forty years old, made in 

 Massachusetts in winter by Dr. William H. Rollins, to 

 whom we are indebted for the privilege of publishing it. 

 The bark of young trees separates into large, thin, brown, 

 papery scales, which remain for a long time on the trunk 

 and branches, and give them a ragged appearance which 

 other young Oaks do not present. The pendulous habit 

 of the branches and this peculiarity of the bark make the 

 Swamp White Oak, as long as it is young, one of the easiest 

 of all our trees to recognize in winter. The bark of large 

 trees is rough, with thick, pale, flaky scales not very unlike 

 those of the White Oak, although usually rather darker- 

 colored. 



In summer the Swamp White Oak is easily recognized 

 by the leaves. These are oblong or oblong-ovate, with a 

 narrow wedge-shaped base and are very coarsely crenately- 

 serrate, especially above the middle, where there is often, 

 on each side, a deep sinus ; they are six or eight inches 

 long and three or four inches broad, and are smooth and 

 dark green on the upper surface and pale or sometimes 

 nearly white on the lower surface, which is covered usually 

 with fine pubescence. The foliage of no other Oak of the 

 northern states is more beautiful. When the leaves unfold, 

 the upper surface is sometimes pale and sometimes bright 

 red, and the lower surface is thickly coated with white 

 tomentum. The contrast between the colors of the upper 

 and of the lower surfaces of the young leaves makes the 

 Swamp White Oak a delightful object in early May, when 

 the branches are draped with the long catkins of staminate 

 flowers. It is hardly less beautiful in summer, when the 

 wind plays through the foliage and turns to the light first 

 the pale under-surface of the ample leaves and then dis- 

 plays the dark green and glossy covering of their upper 

 surface. In autumn, just before falling, the leaves turn 

 yellowish brown and never assume the brilliant colors put 

 on by many of the Oaks of eastern America. The fruit, 

 which is not produced very abundantly, is borne singly or 

 in pairs on stalks two or three inches long and much 

 longer than the leaf-stems. The upper scales of the cup 

 are pointed and sometimes form a delicate fringe-like mar- 

 gin ; the acorn is an inch long, rather obtuse and bright 

 chestnut-brown when ripe. Squirrels and hogs find it to 

 their liking, and a man, if he was very hungry indeed, 

 might get some satisfaction from eating it ; it is not as 

 sweet and much less palatable than the acorn of the 

 southern Swamp Oak. 



The wood of the Swamp White Oak is perhaps even 

 more valuable than that of the White Oak ; it is hard, 

 strong, close-grained, very tough, and is not distinguished 

 from White Oak by timber merchants. The two woods 

 are used for the same purposes. 



