\ \KK<>\\ -LB w 1 !> CO! rONWOOD 

 Popuhu angustifolia Janu 



The NN illon Famil\ 

 - \i U a I \i: 



Habit and Habitat: \ dender. medium sized tree, LO-60 feel tall, 

 witli a trunk diameter of 8-18 inches, tin- slender, erect or ascending 

 branches forming a narrow, pyramidal, oval or Irregular crown, some- 

 times more or less bushy. Prefers the moist soil of stream banks and 



deep canyons, but will grow well in almost any kind of soil if tl 

 - a sufficient water supply. 



Leaves and Buds: It. alternate, simple, lanceolate, ovate-lan- 



ilate or rarely obovate. 2-.'! inches long, '--1 inch wide, naiTOWe ' 



to a long, tapering, acute or rounded apex, {gradually narrowed, and 



Ige-ahaped at the base, finely serrate, thin but firm, bright yell- 

 en above, smooth or occasionally finely-hairy beneath, leaves on 

 'idly growing- shoots or sprouts are sometimes coarsely serra* 

 inches long and 1-1 1 - inches wide; petiole slender, flattened somewhat 

 on the upper side. Buds very resinous and sticky, ovate, long-point 

 scales 5-7, thin, concave, chestnut-brown, terminal bud 'i- 1 : inch long, 

 lateral buds about one-half as long. 



Flowers and Fruits: Flowers produced in catkins, both the stam- 

 inate and pistillate catkins densely flowered, smooth, l' r '2'j inches long, 

 short-stalked, the pistillate becoming- 2 1 j-l inches long in fruit, their 

 lies broadly obovate, smooth, thin, papery, light brown, deeply cut 

 into many reddish-brown, hair-like lobes, staminate flowers borne in 

 cup-shaped, short-stalked receptacles; stamens 12-20. red; ovary ova 

 more or less 2-lobed, with a short style and 2. irregularly lobed stign 

 Fruit a dry. broadly ovate pod or capsule, short-pointed, thin-walled, 

 with a stalk about Vs inch long; seeds ovate or obovate. light brown, 

 inch long. 



Bark. Twigs and Wood: Young tranches and twigs smooth or 

 rarely finely-hairy, marked by pale specks, at first pale yellowish-green. 

 becoming bright or dark orange-colored in their first winter, finally pale 

 yellow and gray. Bark %-l^s inches thick, light yellow-green or gray 

 at the base, on old t'-ees becoming divided by shallow fissures into broad, 

 flat ridges, but smooth and much thiner above the older base. Wood 

 light brown, with thin, nearly white sapwood, light, tough, weak, wai 

 badly. 



Distribution in the State: The narrow-leaf Cottonwood is a native 



of rn United States where it is found throughout a wide range 



~>.000- 10,000 altitude from Canada to New Mexico and Arizona. The 



worked its way eastward until it has barely entered Nebraska in 



two places, namely, in Sioux and Scottsbluff counties, but is not 



abundant in either of these two localities. Map 



Ressarks: This is the common cotton* I northern Colorado. 



Wyoming, southern Montana and Utah where it in abundance 



along mountain streams and where it is f tly planted as our com- 



mon Cottonwood is planted in this state. The very narrow leaves of this 

 spe f Cottonwood cause some people to call it a willow, but the 



numerous bud e well as the details of the flower structure 



v . srate the two types very readily. 



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