26 
Malus ioensis begins to open its flowers several days later than M. 
glaucescens. This is the common Crab Apple of the northern middle 
western states, and in a number of varieties has a wide range south¬ 
ward through Missouri to western Louisiana and Texas. It is a tree 
sometimes thirty feet high with a trunk often eighteen inches in diam¬ 
eter, a wide open head of spreading branches and usually incised leaves 
tomentose on the lower surface, flowers often two inches wide with 
white or rose-colored petals, and fruit hanging on stout hairy stems, 
and up to an inch and a half in diameter. The common form of this 
tree in southern Missouri, Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma (var. Palm- 
eri), a small tree with spiney branches and smaller leaves, is flowering 
in the Arboretum for the first time this year. A form of this tree 
with double flowers (var. plena), the Bechtel Crab, named for the man 
who found it several years ago growing in the woods in one of the 
western states, has opened its pale rose-colored flowers which look like 
small Roses. When in flower this is one of the popular trees of the 
Arboretum, judging by the number of persons who want to get close 
to it. This double-flowered Crab can now be found in many of the 
large American nurseries, but these nursery trees are often short-lived, 
probably because the common orchard Apple on which they are usually 
grafted does not suit them as stock. Persons buying the Bechtel Crab 
should insist that it be grafted on one of the American Crab Apples, 
the best for the purpose being the single-flowered type of M. ioensis. 
Malus coronaria, sometimes called the Garland Tree, is the common 
eastern species, although it does not approach the coast north of Penn¬ 
sylvania and Delaware and ranges west to Missouri. It is a beautiful 
tree sometimes twenty-five feet high with a short trunk, pink flowers 
rather more than an inch in diameter and depressed globose fruit. 
From M. glaucescens it is distinguished by the green under surface of 
the leaves, and from M. ioensis by the absence of pubescence on the 
leaves, fruit stalks and young shoots. The calyx on one variety (var. 
dasycalyx) not rare in Ohio and Indiana is thickly covered with white 
matted hairs. A form with long acuminate leaves (var. elongata) which 
sometimes forms dense impenetrable thickets grows in western New 
York to Ohio, and on the southern Appalachian Mountains from West 
Virginia to North Carolina. Recently a double-flowered form of M. 
coronaria has been found growing in the woods near Waukegan, Illinois 
(var. Charlottae or the Charlotte Crab). The flowers are larger and 
whiter than those of the Bechtel Crab, and there is no reason why the 
Charlotte Crab should not become as great or a greater garden favorite. 
It is now growing in the Arboretum but the plants are too young to 
flower. 
Malus platycarpa has fruit much broader than high, often two and a 
half inches in diameter with a deep cavity at base and apex. The 
flowers are about an inch and a half wide with a glabrous pedicel and 
calyx, but in the var. Hoopesii with a pubescent calyx. There is a 
large tree of this variety in the old Malus collection opposite the end 
of the Meadow Road. M. platycarpa is a handsome tree well worth a 
place in collections for its beautiful fruit valuable for cooking and 
jellies. The so-called Mammoth Crab is probably a hybrid of this species 
and the orchard Apple-tree. 
