LEGUMINOS^— PEA FAMILY 



LOCUST. ACACIA, YELLOW LOCUST. BLACK 

 LOCUST 



RobiJiia pse:tdaciicia. 



Robinia commemorates the botanical labors of Jean Robin, her- 

 balist of Henry III. and director of the gardens of the Louvre 

 under Henry IV, and Louis XIII, His son Vespasian Robin 

 first cultivated the Locust tree in Europe. Pseitdacacia, like 

 the acacia. 



Often cultivated as an ornamental tree throughout the north, but 

 native from Pennsylvania to northern Georgia and ivestward as far 

 as Arkansas and Indian Territory. Reaches the height of seventy 

 feet with a trunk three or four feet in diameter, with brittle branches 

 that form an oblong narrow head. Spreads by underground shoots. 



Bark. — Dark gray brown tinged with red, deeply furrowed, sur- 

 face inclined to scale. Branchlets at first coated with white silvery 

 down. This soon disappears and they become pale green, afterward 

 reddish brown. Prickles develop from stipules, are short, some- 

 what triangular, dilated at base, sharp, dark purple, adhering only 

 to the bark, but persistent. 



Wood. — Pale yellowisli Ijrown ; heavy, hard, strong, close-grained 

 and very durable in contact with the ground. Sp. gr., 0.7333 ; weight 

 of cu. ft., 45.70 lbs. 



Winter Buds. — Minute, n.aked, three or four together, protected 

 in a depression by a scale-like covering lined on the inner surface 

 with a thick coat of tomentum and opening in early spring ; when 

 forming are covered by the swollen base of the petiole. 



Leaves. — Alternate, compound, odd-pinnate, eight to fourteen 

 inches long, with slender hairy petioles, grooved and swollen at the 

 base. Leaflets petiolatc, seven to nine, one to two inches long, one- 

 half to three-fourths of an inch broad, emarginate or rounded at 



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