Handbook of the Trees of New England Part 27

Maine,--not reported north of Oldtown (Pen.o.bscot county); frequent throughout the other New England states.

South to Florida; west to North Dakota, Kansas, and Texas, extending through Mexico, along the Pacific coast of Central America to Peru.

=Habit.=--Usually a medium-sized tree, 30-50 feet in height, with a trunk diameter varying from 8 or 10 inches to 2 feet; attaining much greater dimensions in the middle and southern states; branches few, large, often tortuous, subdividing irregularly; head open, widest near the base, rather ungraceful when naked, but very attractive when clothed with bright green, polished foliage, profusely decked with white flowers, or laden with drooping racemes of handsome black fruit.

=Bark.=--Bark of trunk deep reddish-brown and smooth in young trees, in old trees very rough, separating into close, thick, irregular, blackish scales; branches dark reddish-brown, marked with small oblong, raised dots. Bitter to the taste.

=Winter Buds and Leaves.=--Buds ovate, 1/8 inch long, covered with imbricated brown scales.

Leaves 2-5 inches long, about half as wide, dark green above and glossy when full grown, paler below, turning in autumn to orange, deep red, or pale yellow, firm, smooth on both sides, elliptical, oblong, or lanceolate-oblong; finely serrate with short, incurved teeth; apex sharp; base acute or roundish; meshes of veins minute; petioles 1/2 inch long, with usually two or more glands near the base of the leaf; stipules glandular-edged, falling as the leaf expands.

=Inflorescence.=--May to June. From new leafy shoots, in simple, loose racemes, 4-5 inches long; flowers small; calyx with 5 short teeth separated by shallow sinuses, persistent after the cherry falls; petals 5, spreading, white, obovate; stamens numerous; pistil one; style single.

=Fruit.=--September. Somewhat flattened vertically, 1/4 inch in diameter; purplish-black, edible, slightly bitter.

=Horticultural Value.=--Hardy in New England; in rich soil in open situations young trees grow very rapidly, old trees rather slowly.

Seldom used for ornamental purposes, but serves well as a nurse tree for forest plantations, or where quick results and a luxurious foliage effect is desired, on inland exposures or near the seacoast. The branches are very liable to disfigurement by the black-knot and the foliage by the tent-caterpillar. Large plants are seldom for sale, but seedlings may be obtained in large quant.i.ties and at low prices. A weeping horticultural form is occasionally offered. Propagated from seed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE LXV.--Prunus serotina.]

1. Winter buds.

2. Flowering branch.

3. Flower with part of perianth and stamens removed.

4. A petal.

5. Fruiting branch.

6. Mature leaf.

=Prunus Avium, L.=

MAZARD CHERRY.

Introduced from England; occasionally spontaneous along fences and the borders of woodlands. As an escape, 25-50 feet high, with a trunk diameter of 1-2 feet; head oblong or ovate; branches mostly ascending.

Leaves ovate to obovate, more or less p.u.b.escent beneath, serrate, 3-5 inches long; leafstalk about 1/2 inch long, often glandular near base of leaf; inflorescence in umbels; flowers white, expanding with the leaves; fruit dark red, sweet, mostly inferior or blighted.

LEGUMINOSae. PULSE FAMILY.

=Gleditsia triacanthos, L.=

HONEY LOCUST. THREE-THORNED ACACIA.

=Habitat and Range.=--In its native habitat growing in a variety of soils; rich woods, mountain sides, sterile plains.

Southern Ontario.

Maine,--young trees in the southern sections said to have been produced from self-sown seed (M. L. Fernald); New Hamps.h.i.+re and Vermont,--introduced; Ma.s.sachusetts,--occasional; Rhode Island,--introduced and fully at home (J. F. Collins); Connecticut,--not reported. Probably sparingly naturalized in many other places in New England.

Spreading by seed southward; indigenous along the western slopes of the Alleghanies in Pennsylvania; south to Georgia and Alabama; west from western New York through southern Ontario (Canada) and Michigan to Nebraska, Kansas, Indian territory, and Texas.

=Habit.=--A medium-sized tree, reaching a height of 40-60 feet and a trunk diameter of 1-3 feet; becoming a tree of the first magnitude in the river bottoms of Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee; trunk dark and straight, the upper branches going off at an acute angle, the lower often horizontal, both trunk and larger branches armed above the axils with stout, sharp-pointed, simple, three-p.r.o.nged or numerously branched thorns, sometimes cl.u.s.tered in forbidding tangles a foot or two in length; head wide-spreading, very open, rounded or flattish, with extremely delicate, fern-like foliage lying in graceful planes or ma.s.ses; pods flat and pendent, conspicuous in autumn.

=Bark.=--Trunk and larger branches a sombre iron gray, deepening on old trees almost to black; yellowish-brown in second year's growth; season's shoots green, marked with short buff, longitudinal lines; branchlets rough-dotted.

=Winter Buds and Leaves.=--Winter buds minute, in cl.u.s.ters of three or four, the upper the largest. Leaves compound, once to twice pinnate, both forms often in the same leaf, alternate, 6 inches to 1 foot long, rachis abruptly enlarged at base and covering the winter buds: leaflets 18-28, 3/4-1-1/4 inches long, about one-third as wide, yellowish-green when unfolding, turning to dark green above, slightly lighter beneath, yellow in autumn; outline lanceolate, oblong to oval, obscurely crenulate-serrate; apex obtuse, scarcely mucronate; base mostly rounded; leafstalks and leaves downy, especially when young.

=Inflorescence.=--Early June. From lateral or terminal buds on the old wood, in slender, pendent, greenish racemes scarcely distinguishable among the young leaves; sterile and fertile flowers on different trees or on the same tree and even in the same cl.u.s.ter; calyx somewhat campanulate, 3-5-cleft; petals 3-5, somewhat wider than the sepals, and inserted with the 3-10 stamens on the calyx: pistil in sterile flowers abortive or wanting, conspicuous in the fertile flowers. Parts of the flower more or less p.u.b.escent, arachnoid-p.u.b.escent within, near the base.

=Fruit.=--Pods dull red, 1-1-1/2 feet long, flat, pendent, and often twisted, containing several flat brown seeds.

=Horticultural Value.=--Hardy throughout New England, grows in any well-drained soil, but prefers a deep, rich loam; transplants readily, grows rapidly, is long-lived, free from disease, and makes a picturesque object in ornamental plantations, but is objectionable in public places and highly finished grounds on account of the stiff spines, which are a source of danger to pedestrians, and also on account of the long strap-shaped pods, which litter the ground. There is a thornless form which is better adapted than the type for ornamental purposes. The type is sometimes offered in nurseries at a low price by the quant.i.ty.

Propagated from seed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE LXVI.--Gleditsia triacanthos.]

1. Winter buds.

2. Winter buds with thorns.

3. Flowering branch.

4. Sterile flower, enlarged.

5. Flowering branch, flowers mostly fertile.

6. Fertile flower, enlarged.

7. Fruiting branch.

8. Leaf partially twice pinnate.

=Robinia Pseudacacia, L.=

LOCUST.

=Habitat and Range.=--In its native habitat growing upon mountain slopes, along the borders of forests, in rich soils.

Naturalized from Nova Scotia to Ontario.

Maine,--thoroughly at home, forming wooded banks along streams; New Hamps.h.i.+re,--abundant enough to be reckoned among the valuable timber trees; Vermont,--escaped from cultivation in many places; Ma.s.sachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut,--common in patches and thickets and along the roadsides and fences.

Native from southern Pennsylvania along the mountains to Georgia; west to Iowa and southward.

=Habit.=--Mostly a small tree, 20-35 feet high, under favorable conditions reaching a height of 50-75 feet; trunk diameter 8 inches to 2 1/2 feet; lower branches thrown out horizontally or at a broad angle, forming a few-branched, spreading top, clothed with a tender green, delicate, tremulous foliage, and distinguished in early June by loose, pendulous cl.u.s.ters of white fragrant flowers.

=Bark.=--Bark of trunk dark, rough and seamy even in young trees, and armed with stout p.r.i.c.kles which disappear as the tree matures; in old trees coa.r.s.ely, deeply, and firmly ridged, not flaky; larger branches a dull brown, rough; branchlets grayish-brown, armed with p.r.i.c.kles; season's shoots green, more or less rough-dotted, thin, and often striped.

=Winter Buds and Leaves.=--Winter buds minute, partially sunken within the leaf-scar. Leaves pinnately compound, alternate; petiole swollen at the base, covering bud of the next season; often with spines in the place of stipules; leaflets 7-21, opposite or scattered, 3/4-1-1/4 inches long, about half as wide, light green; outline ovate or oval-oblong; apex round or obtuse, tipped with a minute point; base truncate, rounded, obtuse or acutish; distinctly short-stalked; stipellate at first.

=Inflorescence.=--Late May or early June. Showy and abundant, in loose, pendent, axillary racemes; calyx short, bell-shaped, 5-cleft, the two upper segments mostly coherent; corolla shaped like a pea blossom, the upper petal large, side petals obtuse and separate; style and stigma simple.