726 



Handbook of N alure-Sttidy 



A Pacific Coast live oak showing the effects of constant, strong winds from one direction. 

 Photo by G. K. Gilbert. CoiirteKy of U. S. Geological Survey. 



TREE STUDY 



Teacher's Story 



"I wonder if they like it — being trees? 

 I suppose they do. 



It must feel so good to have the ground so flat. 

 And feel yourself stand straight up like that. 

 So stiff in the middle, and then branch at ease. 

 Big houghs that arch, small ones that bend and blow, 

 And all those fringy leaves that flutter so. 

 You'd think they'd break off at the lower end 

 When the wind fills them, and their great heads bend. 

 But when you think of all the roots they drop. 

 As much at bottom as there is on top, 

 A double tree, widespread in earth and air, 

 Like a reflection in the water there." 



— "Tree Feelings" by Charlotte Perkins Stetson 



ATURAL is our love for trees ! A tree is a 

 living being, with a life comparable to our own. 

 In one way it differs from us greatly: it is sta- 

 tionary, and it has roots and trunk instead of 

 legs and body ; it is obliged to wait to have 

 what it needs come to it, instead of being able 

 to search the wide world over to satisfy its 

 wants. 



THE PARTS OF THE TREE 



The head, or crown, is composed of the 



branches as a whole, which in turn are composed 



of the larger and smaller branches and twigs. 



The spray is the term given to the outer twigs, the finest divisions of the 



trunk, which bear the leaves and fruit. The branches are divisions of the 



bole, or trunk, which is the body, or stem, of the tree. The bole, at the base, 



