DESCRIPTION OF FOREST TREES. 
BY J. M. BIGELOW, M. B. 
Pinus (Abies) Douglasii. —Douglas Spruce, or called simply Spruce in some regions ; Oregon 
Pine about San Francisco ; and Hemlock in other places. 
The first place on the route where it is found is on the Sandia mountains, east of the Bio 
Grande, and between it and the Eio Pecos. It grows there abundantly. It next occurs on 
what is called the Sierra Madre, about ninety miles west of the Eio Grande, and is there also 
quite abundant. We again observed it, but rather sparingly, in the mountains around Zuhi. 
After crossing the Eio Colorado Chiquito we come to a range of mountains, of which tho 
most elevated and prominent peaks, near where we passed, were San Francisco, Bill Williams, 
and Mount Sitgreaves. Here was a belt of forty-five miles or more in width, stretching in a 
southeasterly direction to the Mogoyon or Sierra Blanca, probably as far as the headwaters of 
the Gila. At the Copper Mines, near the Gila, I found it in abundance in 1851, as well as at 
the Organ mountains, near Doha Ana, while connected with the Mexican boundary survey. 
At Aztec Pass, one hundred miles west of San Francisco, it is found again, but not so abund¬ 
antly as at the latter mountain. As soon as we reached the Sierra Nevada, and along the 
whole Coast range as far as Los Angeles, it showed itself in the greatest abundance. It grows 
also in almost every mountainous region of California, from the coast to the highest range of 
the Sierra Nevada. On the mountains of the Sierra Madre, east and west of the Eio Grande, 
at San Francisco and its vicinity near the two Colorados, at the Organ mountains and those of 
the Mimhres near the Copper Mines, this tree grows from ninety to one hundred and twenty 
feet in height, and from three to six feet in diameter. In California it is found of a much 
larger size, frequently attaining the height of two hundred feet or more, and from six to nine 
feet in diameter. The wood is coarse-grained, tough, and hard—so much so as to preclude its 
being used as pine lumber; but it forms most excellent building timber. At San Francisco, 
Sacramento, and other cities of California, this timber is used almost exclusively for making 
plank-roads, side-walks, and piling. Probably one-fourth of the city of San Francisco is thus 
built on piles, driven from ten to fifteen feet into the ground. The wharves at the latter place 
are built exclusively of this timber. 
From its abundance and widely-extended range, it will be seen that this tree will form one of 
the most valuable timber products of the proposed line ; and, from what I have seen of its ap¬ 
plicability to purposes of this kind, I have no hesitation in affirming that it will make railroad 
ties, equal, if not superior, to those of any other wood in the West. This tree has been well 
characterized, and a good figure of the fruit, cone, and branch given in Hooker’s Flor. Boreali 
Americana. 
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