PINE FAMILY 



The Hemlock is one of the most beautiful of the cone 

 bearing trees ; and although similar in general form to the 

 spruces, rigidity has transformed itself into ease and formality 

 into grace and beauty. The branches are slender and pliant, 

 heavily clothed with foliage, drooping in habit and the lower 

 sweep the ground. As the tree becomes older they become 

 large and strong and stand out horizontally. The difference 

 between youth and age is marked. The wood is not valuable, 

 it has neither strength nor durability, but the bark is exten- 

 sively used in tanning and is the chief commercial product of 

 the tree. 



TAMARACK. LARCH. HACMATACK 



Lhrix lariclna. Lhrix americ&na. 



Fifty to sixty feet high, trunk eighteen to twenty inches in diam- 

 eter, when young it forms a narrow pyramidal head and this con- 

 tinues in the forest, but in the open it loses its regular form and 

 develops a broad, open, irregular and often picturesque head. It 

 ranges northward to the arctic circle and its southern limit seems to 

 be along the line of northern Pennsylvania, northern Indiana, north- 

 ern Illinois, and central Minnesota. Prefers cold, deep swamps but 

 is occasionally found on dry land. 



Bark. — Bright reddish brown, separating into thin appressed scales. 

 Branchlets pendulous, the young branches are green, smooth, and 

 glaucous, later light orange brown, gradually they become darker _ 

 and at last are dark brown. 



Wood. — Light brown, very resinous, sapwood nearly white ; heavy, 

 hard, strong; rather coarse-grained, durable in contact with the soil. 

 Used for ship-timbers, fence posts, telegraph poles, and railway ties. 

 Sp. gr.', 0.6236 ; weight of cu. ft., 38.86 lbs. 



Winter Buds. — -Dark red, globose, lustrous, small. 



Leaves. — Needle-shaped, rounded above keeled below, three- 

 fourths to one and one-fourth inches long, at first bright green, 

 later dark green. They turn pale yellow and fall in October. They 

 are borne, either scattered on leading shoots, or in crowded fascicles 

 on short lateral branchlets, each leaf in the axil of a minute, decid- 

 uous bud scale. 



Flowers. — May, with the leaves. Monoecious. Staminate flowers 

 subglobose, sessile, usually borne on branchlets one or two years 

 old ; composed of many short-stalked anthers spirally arranged 



476 



