YELLOW BIRCH 



This birch is named from its golden bark. On an old 

 trunk, the bark simply suggests the color, it is rather a silver 

 gray with a yellow flush ; and in extreme old age the surface 

 is shaggy with light gray plates the size of a hand. On 

 young trees, when the yellow inner bark is covered by an un- 

 broken, thin, brown, outer layer the result is a dull yellowish 

 brown. But, now and then, in the leafless woods one comes 

 upon a young tree six or eight inches in diameter upon whose 

 trunk the thin outer bark has been loosened and frayed by 

 the wind until it clings a mass of silvery shreds and patches, 

 revealing in the March and A'pril sunshine an inner bark of 

 the most exquisite golden yellow. This disheveled wood- 

 nymph of the forest is rare, but once found its beauty is never 

 forgotten. 



SWEET BIRCH, BLACK BIRCH, MAHOGANY BIRCH 



B^tula Unta. 



Generally distributed, most abundant northward, but reaches its 

 greatest size on the mountains of Tennessee. Usually seventy to 

 eighty feet high with a round-topped, open head. Prefers moist 

 situations, mountain slopes and borders of streams. 



Bark. — Spicy aromatic. Dark brown with a reddish tinge. On 

 old trunks deeply furrowed and broken into thick irregular plates ; 

 on young stems and on branches close, smooth, lustrous and marked 

 with pale horizontal lenticels. Does not separate into thin layers as 

 the paper birch. Branchlets at first pale green, slightly viscid, later 

 they change from dark orange brown to bright red brown and finally 

 to dark reddish brown. 



Wood. — Dark brown tinged with red, sapwood light brown or yel- 

 low ; heavy, very strong, hard, close-grained, satiny and capable of 

 receiving a fine polish. Used largely in the manufacture of furni- 

 ture, hubs of wheels, small articles and fuel. Sp. gr., 0.7617 ; weight 

 of cu. ft., 47.47 lbs. 



Winter Buds. — Pale chestnut brown, slender, acute, one-fourth 

 of an inch long. 



Leaves. — Alternate, two and one-half to six inches long, one and 

 a half to three inches wide, ovate or oblong-ovate, heart-shaped or 

 rounded, often unequal at base, doubly serrate, acute or acuminate. 

 They come out of the bud plicate, pale green, downy ; when full 



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