152 
WAYSIDE AND WOODLAND TREES. 
used for tanning, and Venice turpentine is a product of the tree. 
Unlike most Conifers, it has the power of sending out new 
shoots when the branches have been removed close up to the 
stem. 
Larch plantations sometimes present the appearance of death 
whilst they are still covered with foliage, but the leaves are 
yellow and twisted. This most frequently occurs in the case of 
trees between the ages of ten and fourteen years, and is due to 
the depredations of a leaf-mining caterpillar, which ultimately 
changes into a minute moth, the Larch-miner {Coleophora 
laricelld). It feeds in the interior of the Larch-needles, and 
therefore is beyond the reach of destruction, except by felling 
and burning affected trees, to prevent the spread of the pest. 
Its ravages keep the tree in ill-health, and apparently prepare 
the way for the deadly attack of another small enemy, known 
as the Larch Canker — the fungus Peziza willkommii. Sickly 
trees are also liable to the attentions of a Wood-wasp (Sirex 
juveticus), whose appearance is usually the cause of a little 
terror in nervous persons. It has two pairs of smoky trans- 
parent wings, and its stout, straight, blue body terminates in a 
long slender point. Its large white grub spends two or three 
years tunnelling towards the heart of the tree and out to the 
bark again, but rarely attacks sound trees. It sometimes 
makes its appearance in a house from wood that has been used 
for building purposes. 
The Silver Fir {Abies pectinatd). 
Evelyn has left on record the fact that a two-year-old 
specimen of the Silver Fir was planted in Harefield Park, 
near Uxbridge, in the year 1603, and this is usually regarded 
as the date of its introduction to England, though the evidence 
is by no means conclusive. Its home is in the mountain 
regions of Central and Southern Europe. Its highest range 
