Slender Willow 



195 



range it is a mere shrub, s meters high or less, or a very small tree, but westward 

 it sometimes becomes a tree up to 20 meters high, with a trunk 6 dm. thick. Salix 

 fluviatilis Nuttall, to which this plant has been referred by some authors, described 

 originally from Oregon or Washington, appears 

 to be distinct from it, and is not known to us 

 to become a tree. 



Its bark is brown, rather thin, nearly smooth; 

 the slender young twigs are either smooth or 

 finely hairy, reddish or purplish, becoming 

 brown; the winter buds are ovoid, pointed, 

 smooth, 3 or 4 mm. long. The linear-lanceo- 

 late or slightly oblanceolate leaves, often some- 

 what scythe-shaped, are 5 to 15 cm. long, 4 to 

 10 mm. wide, usually spinulose- toothed, pointed 

 at both ends, usually smooth on both sides 

 and bright green when old, but when young 

 quite silvery-silky; their stalks are short, 6 mm. 

 long or less, their stipules lanceolate to ovate, 

 small, early falling. The stalked catkins, which 

 are from 2 to 5 cm. long, appear on leafy branchlets in April or May, their hairy 

 bracts oblong to obovate, blunt, hairy, mostly entire-margined; the staminate 

 flowers have 2 stamens with filaments somewhat hairy toward the base; the pistil- 

 late flowers have a narrowly oblong, usually hairy ovary, the lobed stigmas nearly 

 sessile. The ripe fruiting catkins are 6 cm. long or less, the smooth ovoid-conic 

 capsule very short-stalked, about 6 mm. long. 



The wood is of little value, except for fuel or charcoal; it is soft, weak, light 

 brown, and has a specific gravity of about. 0.49, the sapwood nearly white. Seed- 

 ling plants of this species sometimes have laciniate leaves. 



Fig. 154. — Sandbar Willow. 



Fig. 155. — Slender Willow. 



15. SLENDER WILLOW - 

 Saliz exigua Nuttall 



Salix fluviatilis exigua Sargent. Salix 

 luteosericea Rydberg 



The Slender willow inhabits river- 

 shores and the borders of lakes from 

 Wyoming to Athabasca, British Co- 

 lumbia, Colorado, Nebraska, Texas, 

 and southern California, thus ex- 

 tending over nearly the whole of the 

 western United States and of south- 

 western British America. It is 

 closely related to Salix interior 



