■60 TIMBER TREES OF NORTH CAROLINA. 



Forest trees bear fruit abundantly about every third or fourth 

 year ; trees growing in the open more frequently. Seedlings are 

 common in moist, rather open situations. In the higher moun- 

 tains, where only it grows large enough to be of economic impor- 

 tance, trees over three feet in diameter are apt to be hollow or red- 

 hearted. Old trees are often shaky. After lumbering, the black 

 ■cherry is frequently followed by birch, ash, spruce, and maple. 



Clisiocampa americana, Stretch, the tent caterpillar, destroys 

 the young trees by denuding them of their foliage. 



The leaves are oblong, smooth, taper-pointed, and iinely-serrate 

 with short incurved teeth. The flowers appear in late spring in 

 long, slender, drooping racemes ; and the fruit is bitter, nearly 

 black when ripe, and from J to i inch in diameter. The blunt 

 01 pointed winter-buds are bright chestnut-brown. 



The wood is light, strong, rather hard, with a close straight 

 grain ; light brown or red in color ; the thin sapwood, of 10 or 12 

 layers of annual growth, yellow. It takes a beautiful polish, and 

 no other North American wood is more suitable for cabinet-mak- 

 ing and fine interior finish. The largest and best trees in all parts 

 of the country have already been cut. The bark yields tonics and 

 sedatives. 



There are only a few bodies of fine trees still standing in west- 

 ern North Carolina. They are situated principally in Mitchell, 

 Yancey, Swain and Macon counties. 



Amelanchier canadensis, Medicus 



(SERVICE TREE. SHAD BUSH. WILD CURRANT.) 



A small tree, with a tall trunk, snihll spreading branches, and 

 pale red-brown scaly bark, reaching a height of 50 feet and a 

 diameter of IS inches. 



It occurs from Newfoundland along the shores of the Great 

 Lakes, southward to northern Florida, and westward to Minnesota, 

 ■eastern Nebraska, eastern Kansas, 'Louisiana, and southern Arkan- 

 sas ; reaching its best development in the mountains of North 

 Carolina and Tennessee. 



In the coastal plain region of North Carolina it is hardly more 

 than a shrub, and is known as wild currant. It reaches its largest 



