CHAPTER VIII. 



THE NATIVE TREES OF WEST VIRGINIA. 



It has already been pointed out in a preceding chapter that 

 West Virginia is favorably located for the growth of forests, 

 ''being in that favored belt of temperature between about 37 de- 

 grees and 41 degrees north latitude." The geographic position, 

 the topography, and the elevation of the State are such that a 

 very large percentage, indeed, of the species of trees that are 

 indigenous to the northern states east of the Rocky Mountains 

 and as far south as the southern border of Virginia find 

 extensive areas of adaptibility for their healthy exist- 

 ence. The Alleghany mountain region admits several species of 

 cone-bearing trees that belong, primarily, to southern Canada 

 and the states of the extreme northeast ; the low, fertile Potomac 

 valleys provide suitable places for many of the trees of the At- 

 lantic coast region; and the large westward-sloping, trans-Ap- 

 palachian portion of the State, with its numerous low valleys 

 and hills, meets the requirements of many of the trees that be- 

 long to the sub-tropical and middle western regions of the 

 United States. 



The list which follows does not include all the native trees 

 of West Virginia and does not give the complete distribution in 

 the State of many of them. It has been the object to keep on 

 safe ground, giving the names of only such species as have been 

 definitely determined, and mentioning the localities where it 

 is certain they are to be found. A more careful examination 

 will add a score or more of trees to the list as well as many new 

 stations in the distribution of some of those given. A number 

 of additional species of Hawthorns (Crataegus) were collected, 

 but, owing to the present confusion of this genus resulting from 

 widely difiPering interpretation by specialists and probably from 

 the hybridization of nearly related trees, they could not be 



