LET’S KNOW SOME TREES 33 
female) occur on separate trees, the female later developing into 
hanging clusters of winged seeds. 
Like the eastern ashes this tree forms in its rapid-growing new 
shoots a tough elastic timber, highly valued by woodworkers and 
once much sought for wagon tongues. 
' THE CALIFORNIA LAUREL 
The California laurel, a sharply fragrant, broad-leaf evergreen 
tree, is found along streams in the coast hills from southern Oregon 
to Los Angeles and in canyons of the west slopes of the Sierra 
from Shasta to Tulare County. Where conditions are favorable, 
as on certain rich bottoms in Sonoma and Mendocino Counties, it 
F5i147 
FicguRE 21.—California sycamore (Platanus racemosa) 
makes a tree 60 to 80 feet high and 2 to 3 feet in diameter. On a 
sandy Sierra foothill slope it grows into a many-stemmed shrub 4 
to 10 feet high. In either case the leaves are a rich, shining green 
from 3 to 6 inches long and from one-third to 114 inches wide. 
Dried, these form a perfectly good substitute for the bay leaves of 
the French cooks, giving an indescribable flavor to soups, stews, and 
pot roasts but not to be left in pot or kettle more than five minutes, 
it is advised. 
The fruit (technically a drupe) is somewhat nutlike, often solitary 
but sometimes in clusters of two to five, with a pale-green skin that 
eventually turns black and in both stages suggests an olive. But 
don’t follow the suggestion and try to eat it. The wood is much 
the most beautiful of our native woods and is used commercially, 
though to a limited extent, as the species occurs only in scattered 
growth. Because of its lovely red-brown, heavy heartwood, Cali- 
