Woolly Manzanita 761 



is globose to oblong, 6 to 8 mm. long, orange-red, with thin flesh. Seeds com- 

 pressed, minutely hairy. 



The wood is soft, close-grained, reddish brown, its specific gravity about 0.71. 



VII. THE MANZANITAS 



GENUS ARCTOSTAPBreLOS ADANSON 



^RCTOSTAPHYLOS contains probably 40 species of shrubs, some of 

 which occasionally become small trees, others low and prostrate; they 

 occur in the northern hemisphere and are most abundant in western 

 North America; best known is the Bearberry, Arctostaphylos Uva- 

 ursa (Linnaeus) Sprengel, the type of the genus, a low spreading plant, which en- 

 circles the globe in the cooler portions of North America, Europe, and Asia; its 

 leaves have long been used in medicine on account of their diuretic and tonic 

 properties. The fruits of some of our western species are pleasantly acid and are 

 made into jellies; they were an important food for the Indians and are a favor- 

 ite food of bears. 



They have persistent, alternate, thick, leathery leaves, and small flowers borne 

 in terminal racemes, spikes or panicles, subtended by scale-Uke bracts. The calyx 

 is small, s-lobed; the corolla mostly urn-shaped, white to rose-colored, with 5 re- 

 curved teeth; stamens 8 to 10, included, their anthers opening by terminal pores 

 and supplied with 2 tail-like appendages; ovary 4 to lo-celled; ovules solitary and 

 suspended in each cavity. The fruit is drupe-like, with a hard, leathery skin, 

 dryish mealy flesh, and 4 to 10 hard, woody or almost bony, stone-like, i-seeded 

 nutlets, which are more or less firmly consolidated. 



The name is Greek, meaning bear-grape or bear-berry. The following species 

 become arborescent: 



Twigs rather bristly-hairy; bracts of the inflorescence leaf -like; ovary hairy, i. A. tomentosa. 

 Twigs smooth or but slightly hairy; bracts of the inflorescence scale-like; 

 ovary smooth. 



Pedicels smooth; leaves dullish green. 2. A. Manzanita. 



Pedicels glandular-hairy; leaves pale and glaucous. 3. A. glauca. 



I. WOOLLY MANZANITA — Arctostaphylos tomentosa (Pursh) Douglas 



Arbutus tomentosa Pursh 



An evergreen shrub of the northwest from British Columbia to northern Cali- 

 fornia, especially in the Cascade and Coast Mountains, reaching at its greatest 

 development, in southwestern Oregon, a height of 6 meters, with a trunk diameter 

 of 2 dm. 



The twigs are bristly-hairy, grayish green, becoming reddish brown. The leaves 

 are ovate to oblong-eUiptic, usually entire, sometimes minutely toothed; they are 

 light green above, paler and somewhat hairy beneath, 3 to 6 cm. long; the leaf- 



