Abies 773 



ABIES GRANDIS, Giant Fir 



Ahies grandis, Lindley, Penny Cycl. i. 30 (1833); Masters, Gard. Chron. xv. 179, ff. 33-36 (1881) 

 xvii. 400 (1882), and xxiv. 563, ff. 128-131 (1885), and Journ. Linn. Soc. {Bot.), xxii. 174 

 (1886); Sargent, Silva N. Amer. xii. 117, t. 612 (1898), and Trees N. Amer. 60 (1905); 

 Kent, Veitch's Man. Coniferm, 510 (1900). 



Abies Gordoniana, Carrifere, Conif. 298 (1867). 



Abies amabilis, Murray, Froc. Roy. Hort. Soc. iii. 310 (1863) (not Forbes). 



Pinus grandis. Hooker, Fl. For. Amer. ii. 163 (1839). 



Picea grandis, Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. 2341 (in part) (1838). 



A tree attaining in America in the coast regions 300 feet in height and 16 feet 

 in girth ; but on the mountains of the interior rarely more than 100 feet high by 

 6 feet in girth ; often smaller and stunted at high elevations. Bark of young trees 

 smooth, thin, and pale ; of older trees in America, brownish, divided by shallow 

 fissures into low flat ridges roughened by thick appressed scales ; in cultivated trees 

 fissuring into thin irregular plates, exposing the reddish brown cortex. Buds small, 

 conical, obtuse at the apex, resinous, roughened by the raised tips of the scales. 

 Young shoots olive-green, smooth, with a minute, erect, not dense pubescence. 



Leaves on lateral branchlets pectinate, in two lateral sets in the horizontal plane, 

 each set of apparently two ranks, the upper rank with leaves about half the length of 

 those below. Leaves linear, flattened, up to about i^ to 2 inches long, t^ to ^^ inch 

 in width, narrowed at the base, uniform in breadth elsewhere, with a rounded and 

 bifid apex ; upper surface dark green, shining, with a continuous median groove and 

 without stomata ; lower surface with two white bands of stomata, each of about 

 eight lines ; resin-canals marginal. Leaves on cone-bearing branches crowded, less 

 spreading or nearly erect, blunt or bifid at the apex, shorter than on sterile branches. 



Cones 2 to 4 inches long by i to i|- inch in diameter, cylindrical, slightly 

 narrowed towards the rounded or retuse apex, bright green in colour, with the bracts 

 concealed. Scales resembling those of Abies Lowiana, but smaller. Bract 

 situated a little above the base of the scale, quadrangular; upper margin broad, 

 denticulate, deeply emarginate, and with a minute mucro. Seeds f inch long, light 

 brown, with pale shining wings about | inch long. 



Identification 



Abies grandis is readily distinguished by the very flat pectinate arrangement of 

 the leaves ; those of the upper rank being about half the length of those in the 

 lower rank. Abies Lowiana, when growing feebly, resembles it somewhat in arrange- 

 ment ; but in this species the upper surface of the leaves has stomatic lines, absent 

 in A. grandis, and the leaves in the upper rank are only slightly shorter than those 

 in the lower rank. (A. H.) 



