GLAUCOUS WILLOW 
GLAUCOUS WILLOW. PUSSY WILLOW 
Salix discolor. 
A small tree rarely more than twenty feet in height, more often a 
shrub. 
Bark.—Light greenish brown sometimes tinged with red, scaly. 
Branchlets at first are stout, dark reddish purple, coated with pale 
pubescence, later dull green. Buds are dark reddish purple, flat- 
tened, acute, three-eighths of an inch long. 
Leaves.—Come out of the bud convolute, are oblong or oblong- 
ovate or lanceolate, gradually narrowed at both ends, wedge-shaped 
or rounded at base, crenately-serrate, acute. When full grown are 
thick and firm, smooth, bright green above, glaucous or silvery white 
below, from three to five inches lor.g, from an inch to an inch and a 
half wide. Midribs are broad, yellow; petioles slender ; stipules 
leaflike, semilunate, acute, dentate, about one-fourth of an inch 
long, deciduous. 
flowers.—Catkins appear in very early spring, before the leaves, 
over an inch long, two-thirds of ai inch thick, white and silky be- 
fore the flowers open. Stamens two with long slender filaments. 
Ovary is elongated, downy, long-stalked and crowned with a short 
style and broad spreading stigmas. 
fruit—Capsule, cylindrical, long pointed, pale brown and downy. 
This willow is common along the banks of streams and 
ranges from Nova Scotia to Manitoba and south to Dela- 
ware; west to Indiana and Illinois and northwestern Mis- 
souri. 
The leaves and twigs of many willows are subject to gall 
growths caused by the stings of insects. The great cone-like 
buds, an inch or more long and three-fourths of an inch in 
diameter which are found at the tips of the branches of Salix 
discolor especially, are an interesting example of these. One 
often sees a Pussy Willow, growing by or fairly in the bed of 
asmall stream, virtually covered with these monstrous buds. 
But open one of them with a sharp knife and within will be 
found the sleeping larva of a gall-fly. This bud is formed of 
many overlapping scales which are crowded and modified 
leaves, all diverted from their normal purpose and com- 
pelled to serve as the covering of an enemy. 
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