Fraxinus 903 



I saw no large specimens of this species in New England or Canada where 

 most of the best have been felled. I noticed at Ottawa that in the autumn its 

 leaves assume a rich purplish colour, which the black and red ashes did not show. 



Michaux says^ that on large trees the bark is deeply furrowed, and divided 

 into small squares from i to 3 inches in diameter ; and that it grows in Maine in 

 company with the white elm, yellow birch, white maple, hemlock, and black spruce, 

 and in New Jersey with red maple, shellbark hickory, and button- wood [Platanus 

 occidentalis), in places that are constantly wet or occasionally flooded. Pinchot and 

 Ashe^ figure a splendid tall straight forest tree with small head and rough bark 

 resembling that of the common ash, and say that its average height in North Carolina 

 is 50 to 80 feet with a diameter of 2 feet to 3 feet. 



Professor Sargent says ^ that the white ash when planted with the common ash 

 in the high regions of central Europe comes into leaf still later than that species, 

 and thus escapes the spring frosts ; it is less able to resist drought than the green 

 ash, and is usually found on moist soil, though it does not like wet swamps, like the 

 black ash. In the forest it sends up a perfectly straight and slender stem to 

 a great height, ash poles 100 feet high and not over a foot in diameter being 

 often seen. A photograph taken in Chester County, Pennsylvania, shows a tree in 

 the open with a rather spreading head and a trunk 15 feet 10 inches in girth. 



Cultivation 



Fraxinus americana is stated by Alton * to have been introduced into England 

 in 1724 by Catesby. Sargent, however, points out that the ash described by Catesby 

 is another species. 



Though very seldom seen, I believe that the American ash will grow in this 

 country, in some places at least, almost as fast as the native ash. My attention was 

 first called to this fact by the very straight, clean, and rapid growth of a young 

 tree at Kew which stands by the walk not far from the Old Conservatory, now the 

 Museum of Timbers. The date of planting is unknown. It measured in 1907 

 63 feet by 2 feet 5 inches, while F. lanceolata, growing near it is 43 feet by 2 feet 

 I inch, and F. oregona, 44 feet by 2 feet 8 inches. 



Knowing that the wood is considered better for oars than that of the native ash, 

 and used exclusively for the heavy oars of our navy, I thought it worth trying as 

 a timber tree, and raised a large number of plants from seed sent me by Messrs. 

 Meehan of Philadelphia as F. americana, but which I found out three years later to 

 be F. lanceolata!" Later on I raised seedlings of the true white ash and found that at 

 first they do not grow nearly so fast as F. lanceolata. They do not ripen the young 



1 N. Amer. Sylva, iii. 49. ^ Trees of North Carolina, p. 71, plate 6. 



' Garden and Forest, vii. 402. * Hort. Kew. iii. 445 (1789). 



' Mr. G. B. Sudworth informs me that ten or fifteen years ago Messrs. Meehan became aware that they had been selling 

 two or three species of ash seed as F. americana, and submitted samples to him for identification. To his great surprise he 

 found that none of it was pure, but contained a mixture oiF. americana, F. lanceolata, and F. pennsyhanica. Since then they 

 have been more carefuL He adds that continental tree planters have, to his knowledge, been planting green and red ash in 

 mistake for white ash ; and it is probable that most of the young trees grown under that name on the continent are incorrectly 

 named. 



