PINETUM DANICUM. 



439 



variety of piu'poses. lu suitable sites in Britaiiij and in deep moist 

 loam, it is a rapid-growing and very handsome tree, its beautiful 

 silvery foliage and long %Yavy branches being very attractive in orna- 

 mental grounds. It is of a wide-spreading habit, and the branches 

 require plenty of room to fully develop their graceful i)roportions. 

 Some of the finest specimens in Scotland are growmg in the policies 

 at Castle Menzies, in Perthshire. As a timber tree it promises to be 

 one of the best of recently introduced Conifers (Trans. Roy. Scot. 

 Arb. Soc. xii. pt. 2). 



Carriere, in his " Traite general des Coniferes," 1st edition, 

 p. 260, calls this Spruce Ficea sitchensis. In the second edition of 

 the same work (p. 318) he calls the tree Ficea Mendesii, Carr. 

 And there he mentions the variety Ficea Menziesii crisjxi, Carr. 

 (Antoine, Conif. t. 33, f. 2). He says the species was introduced in 

 1831, and is very hardy. In the description he only gives the tree a 

 height of 40-50 feet, which makes me think that the tree he observed 

 was either very young or, perhaps, the fine blue but more dwarf 

 variety, Ficea sitcheii,-<is speciosa. He makes the following observa- 

 tion : ''Ficea Menziesii is seldom beautiful in cultivation except when 

 it thrives well, and only when it is young. It soon loses the leaves on 

 its lower branches, or tliey remain dead on the branches, which is not 

 attractive. It is rare that this species attains a height of 25-35 feet. 

 Really it is only a large slu'ub.'"' 



In nursery catalogues especially, Ficea sitchensis has often been, 

 and is still sometimes, mistaken for Ficea pungens, Engelm. 



The silver-white variety is still often called Ficea (or Abies) Men- 

 ziesii argenfeci. From Carriere's above-cited notes as to the size of the 

 tree we might also perhajDS suppose that he had observed a plant 

 growing on ground not suited to the tree. On different soils the 

 tree changes its character, especially of the leaves, or rather needles. 

 I have observed the tree under very diflerent circumstances, and 

 have noticed that sometimes the needles, and also the branches, are 

 more or less stiff", sometimes even rather soft, and thus they change in 

 colour. I do not believe that it is only the soil which makes such altera- 

 tions. The tree does not seem to demand much from the ground ; in 

 somewhat poor ground in Denmark young plants have thriven very well, 

 at least for some years, and have even grown faster than any other 

 species. Some authors and nurserymen believed that the two names 

 Ficea sitchensis and Ficea Menziesii (sometimes with the generic names 

 of Abies and Puius) were not synonyms, but that they belonged to two 

 different species, although it was admitted that they might be closel}^ 

 allied. One species, Ficea Menziesii, would then be the slow-growin 

 one, and Carriere's above-cited remarks might make some people 

 believe this. This one should have its home in Northern California. 

 The other one was then believed to grow much faster and taller. 

 I^ow, however, most authorities agree that there is only one species. 



