WAHOO

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Wahoo

WAHOO(Evonymus Atropurpureus)No one seems to know what the original meaning of the word wahoo was. It is applied to no fewer than six different trees in this country, four of them elms, one a basswood, and one the tree now under consideration. The generic name,Evonymus, appears to be an effort to put somebody’s seal of approval on the name, for it means in the Greek language “of good name.”It belongs to the familyCelastraceæ, which means the staff family. Some designate members of this group as “Spindle trees,” because formerly in Europe the wood was employed for knitting needles, hooks for embroidering, spindles for spinning wheels, and the like. Unless the members of the family in Europe have wood quite different from that of the wahoo tree in this country, no adequate reason can be found for the use of the wood for spindles or staffs, because it is poor material for that purpose. It may be compared with basswood.This beautiful little tree, scarcely more than a shrub in most regions of its growth, is a widely distributed species, its range extending through western New York to Nebraska, southeastern South Dakota and eastern Kansas, and in the valley of the upper Missouri river, Montana, southward to northern Florida, southern Arkansas and Oklahoma. In these localities it is generally a shrub, rarely reaching a height of more than nine or ten feet. It attains the proportions of a tree only in the bottom lands of southern Arkansas, Oklahoma, and in the lower Appalachian regions. The most favorable habitat of the tree is moist soil along the banks of streams. In the southern and western parts of its range, under favorable conditions of soil and climate, and when isolated from other species, the wahoo tree grows to rather large size and develops a wide flat top of slender spreading branches.The largest and most beautiful specimens of wahoo grow in the mountainous regions of West Virginia, eastern Tennessee, and western North Carolina. In these sections it is no unusual thing for a tree of this species to attain a height of sixty or seventy feet and a diameter of twenty or twenty-four inches. It is never found in pure stands but is isolated along the edge of the forest, and thrives best near water courses.The tree is known by a variety of names in the different parts of the country. The Indians are said to have called it wahoo. Burning bush, a very popular name, is especially appropriate, as no brighter dash of color is displayed by any tree than the scarlet fruit of this growth, which remains on the branches long after the leaves have fallen, often until thewinter storms beat it to the ground. The growth is also called occasionally by the name bleeding-heart tree, in reference to the blood-red contents revealed by the bursting fruit.The wahoo in the fall of the year may be identified by the flaming color of its fruit, or rather the seeds of the fruit. The hull bursts and exposes the bright red seeds within. These, contrary to the usual run of red fruits, are not of a glossy surface, and in this the tree is unique. During the summer season, however, identification is not such a simple matter, for the foliage is quite ordinary, and the flat, unassuming flowers have little that is distinctive about them; but as the autumn approaches and the leaves turn a pale yellow color, the tree becomes a conspicuous and beautiful object with its scarlet berries.The bark of the wahoo is ashen gray, thin, furrowed, and divided into minute scales. On the branchlets it is a dark purplish-brown, later becoming brownish-gray.The heartwood of wahoo is white, with a slight tinge of orange. The sapwood, scarcely distinguishable from the heartwood, is more nearly white in tone. The wood is heavy and close-grained but not very hard. It weighs when seasoned a little less than forty pounds to the cubic foot. Such of this wood as is sawed into lumber, which is but a small quantity, sells commercially with poplar saps, thus masquerading like its forest fellow, the cucumber tree. The character of the wood is such that it will not stand exposure to the weather any length of time. It is far from durable, but is remarkably clear from defects and answers admirably many purposes for which sap poplar is desirable.The leaves of the tree are waxy in appearance, opposite, entire, elliptical or ovate in shape, from two to four inches long, one to two broad. They are finely serrate and pointed at both apex and base, and the stems are short and stout.The flowers, which appear in May and June, are definitely four-parted, presenting a Maltese cross in shape. They are half an inch across, and their rounded petals are deep purple in color. The fruit which succeeds these flowers and which ripens in October is also four-parted. It is about half an inch across, a pale purple when full size, and hangs on long slender stems. When ripe the purple husk bursts and reveals the seed enveloped in a scarlet outer coat that fits it loosely. The leaves, bark, and fruit of the wahoo are acrid and are reputed to be poisonous.The wood is one-third heavier than that of yellow poplar, and it is evident that it would not pass as poplar with any one disposed to reject it. It is also much harder than poplar, and is more difficult to season, as it checks badly. The medullary rays are so thin as to be scarcely discernible.The wood contains many very small pores. The bark is said to possess some value for medicinal purposes. No special uses for the wood have been reported, and it is too scarce to be of much value. The tree’s principal importance is as an ornament, and it shows well in winter borders where the bright colors of the seeds are exposed. It is planted both in this country and in Europe. The plantings seldom or never reach tree size.Florida Boxwood(Schæfferia frutescens) is of the same family as wahoo but of another genus, and is quite a different kind of tree. The generic name is in honor of Jakob Christian Schaeffer, a distinguished German naturalist who died in 1790. Two species of this tree occur in the United States, one the Florida boxwood, the other a small, shrubby growth in the dry regions of western Texas and northern Mexico. Florida boxwood is a West Indies tree which flourishes in the Bahamas and southward along the other islands to Venezuela. It has gained a foothold on the islands of southern Florida where it has found conditions favorable and it grows to a height of thirty or forty feet, and reaches a trunk diameter of ten inches, but such are trees of the largest size. The leaves are bright yellow-green, about two inches long, and one or less in width. They appear in Florida in April and persist a full year, until the foliage of the succeeding crop displaces them. The flowers which are small and inconspicuous, open about the same time as the leaves. The fruit is a scarlet berry which ripens in November, and has a decidedly disagreeable flavor. The bark is very thin.When sound wood in sufficiently large pieces is obtainable it is valuable for a number of purposes, but chiefly as a substitute for Turkish boxwood as engraving blocks. The trees are always small in Florida, which is the only place in the United States where they occur, and the largest are often hollow or otherwise defective. The wood weighs 48.27 pounds per cubic foot, thoroughly dry, which is about two pounds heavier than white oak. It is rich in ashes, having about four times as much as white oak. The color of the heartwood is a bright, clear yellow to which is due the name yellow-wood occasionally applied to the tree in the region where it grows, as well as in markets where it is sold. This is not the tree known in commerce as West Indies boxwood, though it may be an occasional substitute. It is said that Florida boxwood was formerly much more abundant in this country than it is now. It was lumbered for the European market at about the same time that the south of Florida was stripped of its mahogany. It is suitable for many small articles where a hard, even-grained wood is wanted.Ironwood(Cyrilla racemiflora) ranges from the coast region of North Carolina to Florida, and west near the coast to Texas. It isknown as leatherwood, burnwood, burnwood bark, firewood, red titi, and white titi. Ten woods besides this are called ironwood in some parts of this country. The name is applied because the hardness of the wood suggests iron. It is not remarkable for its weight nor its strength. The medullary rays are thin and inconspicuous. In color it is brown, tinged with red. It is not apparent why it is a favorite fire wood, for its fuel value does not rate high theoretically, being much below many species with which it is associated. The largest trees rarely exceed a height of thirty feet and a diameter of twelve inches. They flourish in shady river bottoms and along the borders of sandy swamps and shallow ponds.The tree occasionally assumes the form of a bush and sends up many stems which produce almost impenetrable thickets. Aside from its use as fuel, it is in small demand anywhere. In Texas it is sometimes made into wedges, and similar uses for it are doubtless found in other regions where it is abundant. It is named from Domenico Cirillo, an Italian naturalist who died in 1799.Titi(Cliftonia monophylla) is of thecyrillafamily and is one of three species which occasionally pass under that name. It sometimes reaches a height of fifty feet and a diameter of one or more. Its range follows the coast region from South Carolina to Louisiana. It betakes itself to swamps and flourishes in situations that would be fatal to many species. Half under water during many months of the year it is placed at no disadvantage. It grows equally well in shallow swamps which are rarely overflowed. Near the southern limits of its range in Florida it is reduced to a shrub. It is known as ironwood and buckwheat tree. The last name is due to its seeds which are about the size of a buckwheat grain and otherwise resemble it. The flowers appear in early spring on long racemes, and are very fragrant. The wood weighs about thirty-nine pounds per cubic foot, is not strong, but is moderately hard. It is valuable as fuel and burns with a clear, bright flame.Wahoo branch

No one seems to know what the original meaning of the word wahoo was. It is applied to no fewer than six different trees in this country, four of them elms, one a basswood, and one the tree now under consideration. The generic name,Evonymus, appears to be an effort to put somebody’s seal of approval on the name, for it means in the Greek language “of good name.”

It belongs to the familyCelastraceæ, which means the staff family. Some designate members of this group as “Spindle trees,” because formerly in Europe the wood was employed for knitting needles, hooks for embroidering, spindles for spinning wheels, and the like. Unless the members of the family in Europe have wood quite different from that of the wahoo tree in this country, no adequate reason can be found for the use of the wood for spindles or staffs, because it is poor material for that purpose. It may be compared with basswood.

This beautiful little tree, scarcely more than a shrub in most regions of its growth, is a widely distributed species, its range extending through western New York to Nebraska, southeastern South Dakota and eastern Kansas, and in the valley of the upper Missouri river, Montana, southward to northern Florida, southern Arkansas and Oklahoma. In these localities it is generally a shrub, rarely reaching a height of more than nine or ten feet. It attains the proportions of a tree only in the bottom lands of southern Arkansas, Oklahoma, and in the lower Appalachian regions. The most favorable habitat of the tree is moist soil along the banks of streams. In the southern and western parts of its range, under favorable conditions of soil and climate, and when isolated from other species, the wahoo tree grows to rather large size and develops a wide flat top of slender spreading branches.

The largest and most beautiful specimens of wahoo grow in the mountainous regions of West Virginia, eastern Tennessee, and western North Carolina. In these sections it is no unusual thing for a tree of this species to attain a height of sixty or seventy feet and a diameter of twenty or twenty-four inches. It is never found in pure stands but is isolated along the edge of the forest, and thrives best near water courses.

The tree is known by a variety of names in the different parts of the country. The Indians are said to have called it wahoo. Burning bush, a very popular name, is especially appropriate, as no brighter dash of color is displayed by any tree than the scarlet fruit of this growth, which remains on the branches long after the leaves have fallen, often until thewinter storms beat it to the ground. The growth is also called occasionally by the name bleeding-heart tree, in reference to the blood-red contents revealed by the bursting fruit.

The wahoo in the fall of the year may be identified by the flaming color of its fruit, or rather the seeds of the fruit. The hull bursts and exposes the bright red seeds within. These, contrary to the usual run of red fruits, are not of a glossy surface, and in this the tree is unique. During the summer season, however, identification is not such a simple matter, for the foliage is quite ordinary, and the flat, unassuming flowers have little that is distinctive about them; but as the autumn approaches and the leaves turn a pale yellow color, the tree becomes a conspicuous and beautiful object with its scarlet berries.

The bark of the wahoo is ashen gray, thin, furrowed, and divided into minute scales. On the branchlets it is a dark purplish-brown, later becoming brownish-gray.

The heartwood of wahoo is white, with a slight tinge of orange. The sapwood, scarcely distinguishable from the heartwood, is more nearly white in tone. The wood is heavy and close-grained but not very hard. It weighs when seasoned a little less than forty pounds to the cubic foot. Such of this wood as is sawed into lumber, which is but a small quantity, sells commercially with poplar saps, thus masquerading like its forest fellow, the cucumber tree. The character of the wood is such that it will not stand exposure to the weather any length of time. It is far from durable, but is remarkably clear from defects and answers admirably many purposes for which sap poplar is desirable.

The leaves of the tree are waxy in appearance, opposite, entire, elliptical or ovate in shape, from two to four inches long, one to two broad. They are finely serrate and pointed at both apex and base, and the stems are short and stout.

The flowers, which appear in May and June, are definitely four-parted, presenting a Maltese cross in shape. They are half an inch across, and their rounded petals are deep purple in color. The fruit which succeeds these flowers and which ripens in October is also four-parted. It is about half an inch across, a pale purple when full size, and hangs on long slender stems. When ripe the purple husk bursts and reveals the seed enveloped in a scarlet outer coat that fits it loosely. The leaves, bark, and fruit of the wahoo are acrid and are reputed to be poisonous.

The wood is one-third heavier than that of yellow poplar, and it is evident that it would not pass as poplar with any one disposed to reject it. It is also much harder than poplar, and is more difficult to season, as it checks badly. The medullary rays are so thin as to be scarcely discernible.The wood contains many very small pores. The bark is said to possess some value for medicinal purposes. No special uses for the wood have been reported, and it is too scarce to be of much value. The tree’s principal importance is as an ornament, and it shows well in winter borders where the bright colors of the seeds are exposed. It is planted both in this country and in Europe. The plantings seldom or never reach tree size.

Florida Boxwood(Schæfferia frutescens) is of the same family as wahoo but of another genus, and is quite a different kind of tree. The generic name is in honor of Jakob Christian Schaeffer, a distinguished German naturalist who died in 1790. Two species of this tree occur in the United States, one the Florida boxwood, the other a small, shrubby growth in the dry regions of western Texas and northern Mexico. Florida boxwood is a West Indies tree which flourishes in the Bahamas and southward along the other islands to Venezuela. It has gained a foothold on the islands of southern Florida where it has found conditions favorable and it grows to a height of thirty or forty feet, and reaches a trunk diameter of ten inches, but such are trees of the largest size. The leaves are bright yellow-green, about two inches long, and one or less in width. They appear in Florida in April and persist a full year, until the foliage of the succeeding crop displaces them. The flowers which are small and inconspicuous, open about the same time as the leaves. The fruit is a scarlet berry which ripens in November, and has a decidedly disagreeable flavor. The bark is very thin.

When sound wood in sufficiently large pieces is obtainable it is valuable for a number of purposes, but chiefly as a substitute for Turkish boxwood as engraving blocks. The trees are always small in Florida, which is the only place in the United States where they occur, and the largest are often hollow or otherwise defective. The wood weighs 48.27 pounds per cubic foot, thoroughly dry, which is about two pounds heavier than white oak. It is rich in ashes, having about four times as much as white oak. The color of the heartwood is a bright, clear yellow to which is due the name yellow-wood occasionally applied to the tree in the region where it grows, as well as in markets where it is sold. This is not the tree known in commerce as West Indies boxwood, though it may be an occasional substitute. It is said that Florida boxwood was formerly much more abundant in this country than it is now. It was lumbered for the European market at about the same time that the south of Florida was stripped of its mahogany. It is suitable for many small articles where a hard, even-grained wood is wanted.

Ironwood(Cyrilla racemiflora) ranges from the coast region of North Carolina to Florida, and west near the coast to Texas. It isknown as leatherwood, burnwood, burnwood bark, firewood, red titi, and white titi. Ten woods besides this are called ironwood in some parts of this country. The name is applied because the hardness of the wood suggests iron. It is not remarkable for its weight nor its strength. The medullary rays are thin and inconspicuous. In color it is brown, tinged with red. It is not apparent why it is a favorite fire wood, for its fuel value does not rate high theoretically, being much below many species with which it is associated. The largest trees rarely exceed a height of thirty feet and a diameter of twelve inches. They flourish in shady river bottoms and along the borders of sandy swamps and shallow ponds.

The tree occasionally assumes the form of a bush and sends up many stems which produce almost impenetrable thickets. Aside from its use as fuel, it is in small demand anywhere. In Texas it is sometimes made into wedges, and similar uses for it are doubtless found in other regions where it is abundant. It is named from Domenico Cirillo, an Italian naturalist who died in 1799.

Titi(Cliftonia monophylla) is of thecyrillafamily and is one of three species which occasionally pass under that name. It sometimes reaches a height of fifty feet and a diameter of one or more. Its range follows the coast region from South Carolina to Louisiana. It betakes itself to swamps and flourishes in situations that would be fatal to many species. Half under water during many months of the year it is placed at no disadvantage. It grows equally well in shallow swamps which are rarely overflowed. Near the southern limits of its range in Florida it is reduced to a shrub. It is known as ironwood and buckwheat tree. The last name is due to its seeds which are about the size of a buckwheat grain and otherwise resemble it. The flowers appear in early spring on long racemes, and are very fragrant. The wood weighs about thirty-nine pounds per cubic foot, is not strong, but is moderately hard. It is valuable as fuel and burns with a clear, bright flame.

Wahoo branch

MOUNTAIN LAURELMountain laurelMountain Laurel

Mountain laurelMountain Laurel

Mountain Laurel

MOUNTAIN LAUREL(Kalmia Latifolia)This tree belongs to the heath family and not to the laurels, as the name seems to imply. The same is true of rhododendron. The kalmia genus has five or six species in this country, but only one of tree size, and then only when at its best. Mountain laurel reaches its best development in North and South Carolina in a few secluded valleys between the Blue Ridge and the western mountains of the Appalachian ranges. The largest specimens are forty or fifty feet high and a foot or a foot and a half in diameter. Trunks are contorted and unshapely, and lumber is never sawed from them.The tree has many names, most of them, however, are applied to the species in its shrubby form. A common name is simply laurel, but that does not distinguish it from the great laurel which is often associated with it. Calico bush is one of its names, and is supposed to be descriptive of the flowers. Spoonwood is one of its northern names, dating back to the times when early settlers, who carried little silverware with them to their frontier homes, augmented the supply by making spoons and ladles of laurel roots. Ivy is a common name, sometimes mountain ivy, or poison ivy. Poison laurel and sheep laurel are among the names also. The leaves are poisonous, and if sheep feed on them, death is apt to follow. The exact nature of the poison is not understood. Sheep seldom feed on the leaves, and do so only when driven by hunger. Other names are small laurel, wood laurel, and kalmia. The last is the name of the genus, and is in honor of Peter Kalm, a Swedish naturalist.The species is found from New Brunswick to Louisiana, but principally among the ranges of the Appalachian mountains. Its thin bark makes it an easy prey to fire and the top is killed by a moderate blaze. The root generally remains uninjured and sends up sprouts in large numbers. Thickets almost impenetrable are sometimes produced in that way.Flowers and foliage of mountain laurel are highly esteemed as decorations, foliage in winter, and the flowers in May and June. The bloom appears in large clusters, and various colors are in evidence, white, rose, pink, and numerous combinations. The seeds are ripe in September, and the pods which bear them burst soon after.The wood of mountain laurel weighs 44.62 pounds per cubic foot. It is hard, strong, rather brittle, of slow growth, brown in color, tinged with red, with lighter colored sapwood. This description applies to the wood of the trunk; but in nearly all cases where mention is made of thewood of this tree, it refers to the roots. These consist of enlargements or stools, often protruding considerably above the ground. If the area has been visited repeatedly by fire, the roots are generally out of proportion to the size of the tops. In that respect they resemble mesquite, except that the enlarged root of mesquite penetrates far beneath the surface while that of mountain laurel remains just below the surface or rises partly above it.The utilization of mountain laurel is not confined to the trunks which reach tree size. Generally it is the root that is wanted. Roots are usually sold by weight, because of the difficulty of measuring them as lumber or even by the cord. The annual product of this material in North Carolina alone amounts to about 85,000 pounds, all of which goes to manufacturers of tobacco pipes and cigar holders. The use of the laurel root for pipes is as old as its use for spoons. Pioneers who raised and cured their own tobacco smoked it in pipes which were their own handiwork. The laurel root was selected then as now because it carves easily, is not inclined to split, does not burn readily, and darkens in color with age. It is cheap material, is found throughout an extensive region, and the supply is so large that exhaustion in the near future is not anticipated.The wood is employed in the manufacture of many small articles other than tobacco pipes. Paper knives, small rulers, turned boxes for pins and buttons, trays, plaques, penholders, handles for buckets, dippers, and firewood, are among the uses for which laurel is found suitable.It is of no small importance for ornamental purposes, and is often seen growing in clumps and borders in public parks and private yards, where its evergreen foliage and its bloom make it a valuable shrub. It is planted in Europe as well as in this country.Great Laurel(Rhododendron maximum) is also in the heath family. More than two hundred species ofrhododendronare known, and seventeen are in this country, but only one attains tree size. The generic name means “rose tree,” and the name is well selected. The flowers are the most conspicuous feature belonging to this species, and few wild trees or shrubs equal it for beauty. It is not native much west of the Alleghany mountains, but grows north and east to Nova Scotia. It is at its best among the mountains, thrives in deep ravines where the shade is dense, and on steep slopes and stony mountain tops. It forms extensive thickets which are often so deep and tangled that it is difficult to pass through them. This laurel is seldom found growing on limestone. It reaches its largest size in the South. Trees thirty or forty feet high and a foot in diameter occur in favored localities. It grows on the Alleghanymountains in West Virginia at an elevation exceeding 4,000 feet and there forms vast thickets. Some use is made of the wood for engraving blocks and as tool handles. It is hard, strong, brittle, of slow growth, and light clear brown. It is frequently planted in parks in this country and Europe, and three or more varieties are distinguished in cultivation. This laurel’s leaves have a peculiar habit of shrinking and rolling up when the thermometer falls to zero or near it. Among the names applied to it are great laurel, rose bay, dwarf rose bay tree, wild rose bay, bigleaf laurel, deer tongue, laurel, spoon hutch, and rhododendron.Catawba Rhododendron(Rhododendron catawbiense) is a rare, large-flowered species of the mountain regions from West Virginia southward to Georgia and Alabama. The wood is not put to use, and the species is chiefly valuable as an ornamental shrub. It seldom reaches large size.Sourwood(Oxydendrum arboreum) follows the Alleghany mountain ranges south from Pennsylvania, and extends into Florida, reaching the Atlantic coast in Virginia, and Indiana, Tennessee, and Louisiana westward. The best development of the species is found among the western slopes of the Big Smoky mountains in Tennessee. It is called sorrel-tree, sour gum, and sour gum bush, on account of the acidity of the leaves when chewed. Arrow-wood, another name, refers to the long, straight stems between the whorls of branches of young trees—those three or four feet high. The stems are of proper size for arrows, and amateur bowmen use them. Those who designate the tree as lily-of-the-valley have in mind the flowers. The shape suggests an opening lily, but the size does not. The flower is about one-third of an inch long, but panicles several inches long are covered with them. They open in July and August, and in September the fruit is ripe. The seed is pale brown and one-eighth of an inch long.The sourwood tree at its best is fifty or sixty feet high and from twelve to eighteen inches in diameter. The bark of young trees is smooth, but on mature trunks it resembles the exceedingly rough bark of an old black gum. In fact, many people suppose this tree to be black gum, never having noticed the difference of leaf, fruit, and flower. The genus consists of a single species. The wood is heavy, hard, compact, and it takes good polish. The medullary rays are numerous, but thin, and they contribute little or nothing to the figure of the wood. The annual rings show little difference between springwood and summerwood, and consequently produce poor figure when the lumber is sawed tangentially. The pores are many and small and are regularly distributed through the yearly ring. Heartwood isbrown, tinged with red, the sapwood lighter. The strength and elasticity of sourwood are moderate. The wood is made into sled runners in some of the mountain districts where it occurs, but no particular qualities fit it for that use. It is occasionally employed for machinery bearings. It has been reported for mallets and mauls, but since it is not very well suited for those articles, the conclusion is that those who so report it have confused it with black gum which it resembles in the living tree, but not much in the wood. Small handles are made of it, and it gives good service, provided great strength and stiffness are not required. Sourwood is not abundant anywhere, and seldom are more than a few trees found in a group.Tree Huckleberry(Vaccinium arboreum) is the only tree form of twenty-five or thirty species of huckleberry in this country. The cranberry is one of the best known species. The range of tree huckleberry extends from North Carolina to Texas, and it reaches its largest size in the latter state where trunks thirty feet high and ten inches in diameter occur, but not in great abundance. The fruit which this tree bears has some resemblance to the common huckleberry, but is inferior in flavor, besides being dry and granular. It ripens in October and remains on the branches most of the winter. The fruit is about a quarter of an inch in diameter, dark and lustrous, and is a conspicuous and tempting bait for feathered inhabitants of swamp and forest. The bark of the roots is sometimes used for medicine, and that from the trunk for tanning, but it is too scarce to become important in the leather industry. The tree is known in different parts of its range as farkleberry, sparkleberry, myrtle berry, bluet, and in North Carolina it is known as gooseberry. The wood is hard, heavy, and very compact; is liable to warp, twist, and check in drying; polishes with a fine, satiny finish. Medullary rays are numerous, broad, and conspicuous; wood light brown, tinged with red. Small articles are turned from it.Mountain laurel branch

This tree belongs to the heath family and not to the laurels, as the name seems to imply. The same is true of rhododendron. The kalmia genus has five or six species in this country, but only one of tree size, and then only when at its best. Mountain laurel reaches its best development in North and South Carolina in a few secluded valleys between the Blue Ridge and the western mountains of the Appalachian ranges. The largest specimens are forty or fifty feet high and a foot or a foot and a half in diameter. Trunks are contorted and unshapely, and lumber is never sawed from them.

The tree has many names, most of them, however, are applied to the species in its shrubby form. A common name is simply laurel, but that does not distinguish it from the great laurel which is often associated with it. Calico bush is one of its names, and is supposed to be descriptive of the flowers. Spoonwood is one of its northern names, dating back to the times when early settlers, who carried little silverware with them to their frontier homes, augmented the supply by making spoons and ladles of laurel roots. Ivy is a common name, sometimes mountain ivy, or poison ivy. Poison laurel and sheep laurel are among the names also. The leaves are poisonous, and if sheep feed on them, death is apt to follow. The exact nature of the poison is not understood. Sheep seldom feed on the leaves, and do so only when driven by hunger. Other names are small laurel, wood laurel, and kalmia. The last is the name of the genus, and is in honor of Peter Kalm, a Swedish naturalist.

The species is found from New Brunswick to Louisiana, but principally among the ranges of the Appalachian mountains. Its thin bark makes it an easy prey to fire and the top is killed by a moderate blaze. The root generally remains uninjured and sends up sprouts in large numbers. Thickets almost impenetrable are sometimes produced in that way.

Flowers and foliage of mountain laurel are highly esteemed as decorations, foliage in winter, and the flowers in May and June. The bloom appears in large clusters, and various colors are in evidence, white, rose, pink, and numerous combinations. The seeds are ripe in September, and the pods which bear them burst soon after.

The wood of mountain laurel weighs 44.62 pounds per cubic foot. It is hard, strong, rather brittle, of slow growth, brown in color, tinged with red, with lighter colored sapwood. This description applies to the wood of the trunk; but in nearly all cases where mention is made of thewood of this tree, it refers to the roots. These consist of enlargements or stools, often protruding considerably above the ground. If the area has been visited repeatedly by fire, the roots are generally out of proportion to the size of the tops. In that respect they resemble mesquite, except that the enlarged root of mesquite penetrates far beneath the surface while that of mountain laurel remains just below the surface or rises partly above it.

The utilization of mountain laurel is not confined to the trunks which reach tree size. Generally it is the root that is wanted. Roots are usually sold by weight, because of the difficulty of measuring them as lumber or even by the cord. The annual product of this material in North Carolina alone amounts to about 85,000 pounds, all of which goes to manufacturers of tobacco pipes and cigar holders. The use of the laurel root for pipes is as old as its use for spoons. Pioneers who raised and cured their own tobacco smoked it in pipes which were their own handiwork. The laurel root was selected then as now because it carves easily, is not inclined to split, does not burn readily, and darkens in color with age. It is cheap material, is found throughout an extensive region, and the supply is so large that exhaustion in the near future is not anticipated.

The wood is employed in the manufacture of many small articles other than tobacco pipes. Paper knives, small rulers, turned boxes for pins and buttons, trays, plaques, penholders, handles for buckets, dippers, and firewood, are among the uses for which laurel is found suitable.

It is of no small importance for ornamental purposes, and is often seen growing in clumps and borders in public parks and private yards, where its evergreen foliage and its bloom make it a valuable shrub. It is planted in Europe as well as in this country.

Great Laurel(Rhododendron maximum) is also in the heath family. More than two hundred species ofrhododendronare known, and seventeen are in this country, but only one attains tree size. The generic name means “rose tree,” and the name is well selected. The flowers are the most conspicuous feature belonging to this species, and few wild trees or shrubs equal it for beauty. It is not native much west of the Alleghany mountains, but grows north and east to Nova Scotia. It is at its best among the mountains, thrives in deep ravines where the shade is dense, and on steep slopes and stony mountain tops. It forms extensive thickets which are often so deep and tangled that it is difficult to pass through them. This laurel is seldom found growing on limestone. It reaches its largest size in the South. Trees thirty or forty feet high and a foot in diameter occur in favored localities. It grows on the Alleghanymountains in West Virginia at an elevation exceeding 4,000 feet and there forms vast thickets. Some use is made of the wood for engraving blocks and as tool handles. It is hard, strong, brittle, of slow growth, and light clear brown. It is frequently planted in parks in this country and Europe, and three or more varieties are distinguished in cultivation. This laurel’s leaves have a peculiar habit of shrinking and rolling up when the thermometer falls to zero or near it. Among the names applied to it are great laurel, rose bay, dwarf rose bay tree, wild rose bay, bigleaf laurel, deer tongue, laurel, spoon hutch, and rhododendron.

Catawba Rhododendron(Rhododendron catawbiense) is a rare, large-flowered species of the mountain regions from West Virginia southward to Georgia and Alabama. The wood is not put to use, and the species is chiefly valuable as an ornamental shrub. It seldom reaches large size.

Sourwood(Oxydendrum arboreum) follows the Alleghany mountain ranges south from Pennsylvania, and extends into Florida, reaching the Atlantic coast in Virginia, and Indiana, Tennessee, and Louisiana westward. The best development of the species is found among the western slopes of the Big Smoky mountains in Tennessee. It is called sorrel-tree, sour gum, and sour gum bush, on account of the acidity of the leaves when chewed. Arrow-wood, another name, refers to the long, straight stems between the whorls of branches of young trees—those three or four feet high. The stems are of proper size for arrows, and amateur bowmen use them. Those who designate the tree as lily-of-the-valley have in mind the flowers. The shape suggests an opening lily, but the size does not. The flower is about one-third of an inch long, but panicles several inches long are covered with them. They open in July and August, and in September the fruit is ripe. The seed is pale brown and one-eighth of an inch long.

The sourwood tree at its best is fifty or sixty feet high and from twelve to eighteen inches in diameter. The bark of young trees is smooth, but on mature trunks it resembles the exceedingly rough bark of an old black gum. In fact, many people suppose this tree to be black gum, never having noticed the difference of leaf, fruit, and flower. The genus consists of a single species. The wood is heavy, hard, compact, and it takes good polish. The medullary rays are numerous, but thin, and they contribute little or nothing to the figure of the wood. The annual rings show little difference between springwood and summerwood, and consequently produce poor figure when the lumber is sawed tangentially. The pores are many and small and are regularly distributed through the yearly ring. Heartwood isbrown, tinged with red, the sapwood lighter. The strength and elasticity of sourwood are moderate. The wood is made into sled runners in some of the mountain districts where it occurs, but no particular qualities fit it for that use. It is occasionally employed for machinery bearings. It has been reported for mallets and mauls, but since it is not very well suited for those articles, the conclusion is that those who so report it have confused it with black gum which it resembles in the living tree, but not much in the wood. Small handles are made of it, and it gives good service, provided great strength and stiffness are not required. Sourwood is not abundant anywhere, and seldom are more than a few trees found in a group.

Tree Huckleberry(Vaccinium arboreum) is the only tree form of twenty-five or thirty species of huckleberry in this country. The cranberry is one of the best known species. The range of tree huckleberry extends from North Carolina to Texas, and it reaches its largest size in the latter state where trunks thirty feet high and ten inches in diameter occur, but not in great abundance. The fruit which this tree bears has some resemblance to the common huckleberry, but is inferior in flavor, besides being dry and granular. It ripens in October and remains on the branches most of the winter. The fruit is about a quarter of an inch in diameter, dark and lustrous, and is a conspicuous and tempting bait for feathered inhabitants of swamp and forest. The bark of the roots is sometimes used for medicine, and that from the trunk for tanning, but it is too scarce to become important in the leather industry. The tree is known in different parts of its range as farkleberry, sparkleberry, myrtle berry, bluet, and in North Carolina it is known as gooseberry. The wood is hard, heavy, and very compact; is liable to warp, twist, and check in drying; polishes with a fine, satiny finish. Medullary rays are numerous, broad, and conspicuous; wood light brown, tinged with red. Small articles are turned from it.

Tree Huckleberry(Vaccinium arboreum) is the only tree form of twenty-five or thirty species of huckleberry in this country. The cranberry is one of the best known species. The range of tree huckleberry extends from North Carolina to Texas, and it reaches its largest size in the latter state where trunks thirty feet high and ten inches in diameter occur, but not in great abundance. The fruit which this tree bears has some resemblance to the common huckleberry, but is inferior in flavor, besides being dry and granular. It ripens in October and remains on the branches most of the winter. The fruit is about a quarter of an inch in diameter, dark and lustrous, and is a conspicuous and tempting bait for feathered inhabitants of swamp and forest. The bark of the roots is sometimes used for medicine, and that from the trunk for tanning, but it is too scarce to become important in the leather industry. The tree is known in different parts of its range as farkleberry, sparkleberry, myrtle berry, bluet, and in North Carolina it is known as gooseberry. The wood is hard, heavy, and very compact; is liable to warp, twist, and check in drying; polishes with a fine, satiny finish. Medullary rays are numerous, broad, and conspicuous; wood light brown, tinged with red. Small articles are turned from it.

Mountain laurel branch

OSAGE ORANGEOsage orangeOsage Orange

Osage orangeOsage Orange

Osage Orange

OSAGE ORANGE(Toxylon Pomiferum)Osage orange belongs to the mulberry family. There are fifty-four genera, three of which are found in the United States, the mulberries, the Osage orange, and the figs. Osage orange is known by several names, the principal one of which refers to the Osage Indians, who formerly lived in the region where the tree grows. It is called orange because the fruit, which is from two to five inches in diameter, looks like a green orange, but it is unfit for food. In its range most people call it bodark or bodock, that being a corruption of the name by which the French designated it, bois d’arc, which means bow wood. It was so called from the fact that Indians made bows of it when they could get nothing better. Its value as material for bows seems to be traditional and greatly overestimated. It is lower in elasticity than white oak and very much lower than hickory, and, theoretically, at least, it is not well suited for bows. The wood is known also as mock orange, bow-wood, Osage apple tree, yellow-wood, hedge, and hedge tree. The last name is given because many hedges have been made of it.Osage orange has been planted in perhaps every state of the Union, and grows successfully in most of them. It is one of the most widely distributed of American forest trees, but its distribution has been chiefly artificial. It was found originally in a very restricted region, from which it was carried for hedge and ornamental planting far and wide. Its natural home, to which it was confined when first discovered, embraced little more than ten thousand square miles, and probably half of that small area produced no trees of commercial size. Its northern limit was near Atoka, Oklahoma, its southern a little south of Dallas, Texas; a range north and south of approximately one hundred miles. Its broadest extent east and west was along Red River, through Cooke, Grayson, Fanning, Lamar, and Red River counties, Texas, about 120 miles. Some Osage orange of commercial size grew outside the area thus delimited, but no large amount. Much of that region, particularly south of Red River, was prairie, without timber of any kind; but scattered here and there were belts, strips, thickets, and clumps of Osage orange mixed with other species. On the very best of its range, and before disturbed by white men, this wood seldom formed pure stands of as much as 100 acres in one body, and since the country’s settlement, the stands have become smaller or have been entirely cleared to make farms. All accounts agree that the Osage orange reaches its highest development on the fertile lands along Boggy and Blue rivers in Oklahoma, though finebodies of it once grew south of the Red River in Texas, and much is still cut there though the choicest long ago disappeared. Few trees are less exacting in soil, yet when it can make choice it chooses the best. In its natural habitat it holds its place in the black, fertile flats and valleys, and is seldom found on sandy soil. It is not a swamp tree, though it is uninjured by occasional floods. The tracts where it grows are sometimes called “bodark swamps,” though marshy in wet weather only.The tree attains a height of fifty or sixty feet when at its best, but specimens that tall are unusual. Trunks are occasionally two or three feet in diameter, but that size is very rare. At the present time probably ten trees under a foot in diameter are cut for every one over that size.Rough and unshapely as Osage trees are, they have been more closely utilized than most timbers. Fence posts are the largest item. The board measure equivalent of the annual cut of posts has been placed at 18,400,000. The posts are shipped to surrounding states, in addition to fencing nearly 40,000 square miles of northern Texas and southern Oklahoma. Houseblocks constitute another important use. These are short posts set under the corners of buildings in place of stone foundations. The annual demand for this kind of material amounts to about 1,000,000 board feet. An equal amount goes into bridge piling. The principal demand comes from highway commissioners. Telephone poles take a considerable quantity, and insulator pins more.One of the most important uses of Osage orange is found in the manufacture of wagon wheels, though the total quantity so used is smaller than that demanded for fence posts.About 10,000 or 12,000 wagons with Osage orange felloes or rims are manufactured annually in the United States. That use of the wood is not new. It began in a small way soon after the settlement of the region. At first the work was hand-done by local blacksmiths and wheelwrights. They found the wood objectionable, from the workman’s standpoint, on account of its extreme hardness and the difficulty of cutting it. That objection is still urged against it though machines have taken the place of the hand tools of former times. Saws and bits are quickly dulled, and the cost of grinding, repair, and replacement increases the operator’s expense much above ordinary mill outlay for such purposes. On that account many prefer to work the wood green. It is then softer, and cuts more smoothly. If seasoned before it is passed through the machines it is liable to “pull.” That term is used to indicate a rough-breaking of the fibres by the impact of knives. The readiness with which the wood splits calls for extraordinary care in boring it, and many felloes are spoiled in finishing them to receive the tenoned ends of spokes.A number of commodities are made of Osage orange but in quantities so small that the total wood used does not constitute a serious drain upon the supply. Police clubs are occasionally made as a by-product of the rim mill. Some years ago at the Texas state fair at Dallas, a piano was exhibited, all visible wood being Osage orange, handsomely polished. The rich color of this wood distinguishes it from all other American species. When oiled it retains the yellow color, but unoiled wood fades on long exposure. Clock cases of Osage have been manufactured locally, and gun stocks made of it are much admired, though the wood’s weight is an argument against it for gun stocks. Canes split from straight-grained blocks, and shaved and polished by hand, are occasionally met with, but none manufactured by machinery have been reported. Sawmills in the Osage orange region use the wood as rollers for carriages and off-bearing tables. Rustic rockers and benches of the wood, with the bark or without it, figure to a small extent in local trade. It has been tried experimentally for parquetry floors, with satisfactory results. Sections of streets have been paved with Osage orange blocks. The wood wears well and is nearly proof against decay, but no considerable demand for such blocks appears ever to have existed. Railroads which were built through the region years ago cut Osage for ties and culvert timber, but no such use is now reported. The demand for the wood for tobacco pipes is increasing, more than 100,000 blocks for such pipes having been sold during a single year.Osage orange weighs 48.21 pounds per cubic foot. It is twenty-eight per cent stronger than white oak, but is not quite as stiff, is very brittle, and under heavy impact, will crumble. For that reason, Osage wagon felloes will not stand rocky roads. The bark is sometimes used for tanning, and the wood for dyeing.Red Mulberry(Morus rubra) is frequently spoken of simply as mulberry, and is sometimes called black mulberry. The full grown fruit is red, but turns black or very dark purple when ripe. The berry is composed of a compact and adhering cluster of drupes, each drupe about one thirty-second of an inch long. What seems to be a single berry is really an aggregation of very small fruits, each resembling a tiny cherry. The mulberry is naturally a forest tree, but it is permitted to grow about the margins of fields, and is often planted in door yards for its fruit and its shade. It is looked upon by many as a tame species.Two mulberries grow naturally in this country. The red species ranges from Massachusetts west to Kansas, and south to Texas and Florida. Its best growth is found in the lower Ohio valley and the southern foot hills of the Appalachian mountains. The largest trees are seventy feet high and three or four in diameter. If this tree were abundant the wood’s place in furniture and finish would be important. The heartwood is dark, of good figure, and fairly strong. It takes a fine polish, and resembles black walnut, though usually of a little lighter shade. Its largest use is as fence posts. It is durable in contact with the soil. The effect when made into furniture, finish, and various kinds of turnery, is pleasing. Farm tools, particularlyscythe snaths, are made of it, and it has been reported for slack cooperage and boat building, but such uses are apparently infrequent. The wood is evidently sold under some other name, or without a name, for the total sawmill output in the United States is given in government statistics at only 1,000 feet, which is probably not one per cent of the cut.Mexican Mulberry(Morus celtidifolia) ranges from southern Texas to Arizona. Trees are seldom more than thirty feet high and one in diameter. The berry is about half an inch long, black, and made up of a hundred or more very small drupes. It is edible, but its taste is insipid. The wood is heavy and is of dark orange or dark brown color. It is suitable for small turnery and other articles, but no reports of uses for it have been found. The tree is occasionally planted for its fruit by Mexicans, but Americans care little for it.Two foreign mulberries have been extensively planted in this country, and in some localities they are running wild and are mistaken for native species. One is the white mulberry (Morus alba), a native of China; the other is the paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera) a different genus, but of the same family. It is a native of Japan, and has been naturalized in some of the southern states. Nine varieties of the white mulberry have been distinguished in cultivation.Osage orange branch

Osage orange belongs to the mulberry family. There are fifty-four genera, three of which are found in the United States, the mulberries, the Osage orange, and the figs. Osage orange is known by several names, the principal one of which refers to the Osage Indians, who formerly lived in the region where the tree grows. It is called orange because the fruit, which is from two to five inches in diameter, looks like a green orange, but it is unfit for food. In its range most people call it bodark or bodock, that being a corruption of the name by which the French designated it, bois d’arc, which means bow wood. It was so called from the fact that Indians made bows of it when they could get nothing better. Its value as material for bows seems to be traditional and greatly overestimated. It is lower in elasticity than white oak and very much lower than hickory, and, theoretically, at least, it is not well suited for bows. The wood is known also as mock orange, bow-wood, Osage apple tree, yellow-wood, hedge, and hedge tree. The last name is given because many hedges have been made of it.

Osage orange has been planted in perhaps every state of the Union, and grows successfully in most of them. It is one of the most widely distributed of American forest trees, but its distribution has been chiefly artificial. It was found originally in a very restricted region, from which it was carried for hedge and ornamental planting far and wide. Its natural home, to which it was confined when first discovered, embraced little more than ten thousand square miles, and probably half of that small area produced no trees of commercial size. Its northern limit was near Atoka, Oklahoma, its southern a little south of Dallas, Texas; a range north and south of approximately one hundred miles. Its broadest extent east and west was along Red River, through Cooke, Grayson, Fanning, Lamar, and Red River counties, Texas, about 120 miles. Some Osage orange of commercial size grew outside the area thus delimited, but no large amount. Much of that region, particularly south of Red River, was prairie, without timber of any kind; but scattered here and there were belts, strips, thickets, and clumps of Osage orange mixed with other species. On the very best of its range, and before disturbed by white men, this wood seldom formed pure stands of as much as 100 acres in one body, and since the country’s settlement, the stands have become smaller or have been entirely cleared to make farms. All accounts agree that the Osage orange reaches its highest development on the fertile lands along Boggy and Blue rivers in Oklahoma, though finebodies of it once grew south of the Red River in Texas, and much is still cut there though the choicest long ago disappeared. Few trees are less exacting in soil, yet when it can make choice it chooses the best. In its natural habitat it holds its place in the black, fertile flats and valleys, and is seldom found on sandy soil. It is not a swamp tree, though it is uninjured by occasional floods. The tracts where it grows are sometimes called “bodark swamps,” though marshy in wet weather only.

The tree attains a height of fifty or sixty feet when at its best, but specimens that tall are unusual. Trunks are occasionally two or three feet in diameter, but that size is very rare. At the present time probably ten trees under a foot in diameter are cut for every one over that size.

Rough and unshapely as Osage trees are, they have been more closely utilized than most timbers. Fence posts are the largest item. The board measure equivalent of the annual cut of posts has been placed at 18,400,000. The posts are shipped to surrounding states, in addition to fencing nearly 40,000 square miles of northern Texas and southern Oklahoma. Houseblocks constitute another important use. These are short posts set under the corners of buildings in place of stone foundations. The annual demand for this kind of material amounts to about 1,000,000 board feet. An equal amount goes into bridge piling. The principal demand comes from highway commissioners. Telephone poles take a considerable quantity, and insulator pins more.

One of the most important uses of Osage orange is found in the manufacture of wagon wheels, though the total quantity so used is smaller than that demanded for fence posts.

About 10,000 or 12,000 wagons with Osage orange felloes or rims are manufactured annually in the United States. That use of the wood is not new. It began in a small way soon after the settlement of the region. At first the work was hand-done by local blacksmiths and wheelwrights. They found the wood objectionable, from the workman’s standpoint, on account of its extreme hardness and the difficulty of cutting it. That objection is still urged against it though machines have taken the place of the hand tools of former times. Saws and bits are quickly dulled, and the cost of grinding, repair, and replacement increases the operator’s expense much above ordinary mill outlay for such purposes. On that account many prefer to work the wood green. It is then softer, and cuts more smoothly. If seasoned before it is passed through the machines it is liable to “pull.” That term is used to indicate a rough-breaking of the fibres by the impact of knives. The readiness with which the wood splits calls for extraordinary care in boring it, and many felloes are spoiled in finishing them to receive the tenoned ends of spokes.

A number of commodities are made of Osage orange but in quantities so small that the total wood used does not constitute a serious drain upon the supply. Police clubs are occasionally made as a by-product of the rim mill. Some years ago at the Texas state fair at Dallas, a piano was exhibited, all visible wood being Osage orange, handsomely polished. The rich color of this wood distinguishes it from all other American species. When oiled it retains the yellow color, but unoiled wood fades on long exposure. Clock cases of Osage have been manufactured locally, and gun stocks made of it are much admired, though the wood’s weight is an argument against it for gun stocks. Canes split from straight-grained blocks, and shaved and polished by hand, are occasionally met with, but none manufactured by machinery have been reported. Sawmills in the Osage orange region use the wood as rollers for carriages and off-bearing tables. Rustic rockers and benches of the wood, with the bark or without it, figure to a small extent in local trade. It has been tried experimentally for parquetry floors, with satisfactory results. Sections of streets have been paved with Osage orange blocks. The wood wears well and is nearly proof against decay, but no considerable demand for such blocks appears ever to have existed. Railroads which were built through the region years ago cut Osage for ties and culvert timber, but no such use is now reported. The demand for the wood for tobacco pipes is increasing, more than 100,000 blocks for such pipes having been sold during a single year.

Osage orange weighs 48.21 pounds per cubic foot. It is twenty-eight per cent stronger than white oak, but is not quite as stiff, is very brittle, and under heavy impact, will crumble. For that reason, Osage wagon felloes will not stand rocky roads. The bark is sometimes used for tanning, and the wood for dyeing.

Red Mulberry(Morus rubra) is frequently spoken of simply as mulberry, and is sometimes called black mulberry. The full grown fruit is red, but turns black or very dark purple when ripe. The berry is composed of a compact and adhering cluster of drupes, each drupe about one thirty-second of an inch long. What seems to be a single berry is really an aggregation of very small fruits, each resembling a tiny cherry. The mulberry is naturally a forest tree, but it is permitted to grow about the margins of fields, and is often planted in door yards for its fruit and its shade. It is looked upon by many as a tame species.Two mulberries grow naturally in this country. The red species ranges from Massachusetts west to Kansas, and south to Texas and Florida. Its best growth is found in the lower Ohio valley and the southern foot hills of the Appalachian mountains. The largest trees are seventy feet high and three or four in diameter. If this tree were abundant the wood’s place in furniture and finish would be important. The heartwood is dark, of good figure, and fairly strong. It takes a fine polish, and resembles black walnut, though usually of a little lighter shade. Its largest use is as fence posts. It is durable in contact with the soil. The effect when made into furniture, finish, and various kinds of turnery, is pleasing. Farm tools, particularlyscythe snaths, are made of it, and it has been reported for slack cooperage and boat building, but such uses are apparently infrequent. The wood is evidently sold under some other name, or without a name, for the total sawmill output in the United States is given in government statistics at only 1,000 feet, which is probably not one per cent of the cut.Mexican Mulberry(Morus celtidifolia) ranges from southern Texas to Arizona. Trees are seldom more than thirty feet high and one in diameter. The berry is about half an inch long, black, and made up of a hundred or more very small drupes. It is edible, but its taste is insipid. The wood is heavy and is of dark orange or dark brown color. It is suitable for small turnery and other articles, but no reports of uses for it have been found. The tree is occasionally planted for its fruit by Mexicans, but Americans care little for it.Two foreign mulberries have been extensively planted in this country, and in some localities they are running wild and are mistaken for native species. One is the white mulberry (Morus alba), a native of China; the other is the paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera) a different genus, but of the same family. It is a native of Japan, and has been naturalized in some of the southern states. Nine varieties of the white mulberry have been distinguished in cultivation.

Red Mulberry(Morus rubra) is frequently spoken of simply as mulberry, and is sometimes called black mulberry. The full grown fruit is red, but turns black or very dark purple when ripe. The berry is composed of a compact and adhering cluster of drupes, each drupe about one thirty-second of an inch long. What seems to be a single berry is really an aggregation of very small fruits, each resembling a tiny cherry. The mulberry is naturally a forest tree, but it is permitted to grow about the margins of fields, and is often planted in door yards for its fruit and its shade. It is looked upon by many as a tame species.

Two mulberries grow naturally in this country. The red species ranges from Massachusetts west to Kansas, and south to Texas and Florida. Its best growth is found in the lower Ohio valley and the southern foot hills of the Appalachian mountains. The largest trees are seventy feet high and three or four in diameter. If this tree were abundant the wood’s place in furniture and finish would be important. The heartwood is dark, of good figure, and fairly strong. It takes a fine polish, and resembles black walnut, though usually of a little lighter shade. Its largest use is as fence posts. It is durable in contact with the soil. The effect when made into furniture, finish, and various kinds of turnery, is pleasing. Farm tools, particularlyscythe snaths, are made of it, and it has been reported for slack cooperage and boat building, but such uses are apparently infrequent. The wood is evidently sold under some other name, or without a name, for the total sawmill output in the United States is given in government statistics at only 1,000 feet, which is probably not one per cent of the cut.

Mexican Mulberry(Morus celtidifolia) ranges from southern Texas to Arizona. Trees are seldom more than thirty feet high and one in diameter. The berry is about half an inch long, black, and made up of a hundred or more very small drupes. It is edible, but its taste is insipid. The wood is heavy and is of dark orange or dark brown color. It is suitable for small turnery and other articles, but no reports of uses for it have been found. The tree is occasionally planted for its fruit by Mexicans, but Americans care little for it.

Two foreign mulberries have been extensively planted in this country, and in some localities they are running wild and are mistaken for native species. One is the white mulberry (Morus alba), a native of China; the other is the paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera) a different genus, but of the same family. It is a native of Japan, and has been naturalized in some of the southern states. Nine varieties of the white mulberry have been distinguished in cultivation.

Osage orange branch

PERSIMMONPersimmonPersimmon

PersimmonPersimmon

Persimmon

PERSIMMON(Diospyros Virginiana)Persimmon belongs to the ebony family, and the family has contributed to the civilization of the human race since very early times. Some of the oldest furniture in existence, that which was found hidden in the ruins of ancient Egypt, is ebony, and there is evidence among the old records in the land of the Nile that the Egyptians made voyages southward through the Red sea and brought back cargoes of ebony from Punt, a region in eastern Africa. The name ebony is believed to be derived from a Hebrew word, probably brought to Palestine by some of Solomon’s captains who traded along the south coast of Asia or the east coast of Africa about the time of the building of the first temple. The botanical name for the genus (diospyros) is made up of two words meaning “Jupiter’s wheat”—supposed to be a reference to the value of persimmons as food. The name, however, is not as old as the Hebrew word, nor is the Hebrew as old as the references to ebony in the records of Egypt. A piece of the old furniture—not less than 4,000 years old—is still in existence. It probably matches in age the cedar of Lebanon coffins in the oldest Egyptian tombs.The ebony family consists of five genera, one of which is persimmon (diospyros). This genus consists of 160 species, only two of them in the United States. Thus the persimmon trees of this country are a very small part of the family to which they belong, but they are a highly respectable part of it. The word persimmon is of Indian origin, and was used by the tribes near the Atlantic coast. The original spelling was “pessimin,” and that was probably about the pronunciation given it by the aborigines.It has never been called by many names. It is known as date plum in New Jersey and Tennessee, and as possumwood in Florida. The avidity with which opossums feed on the fruit is responsible for the name.The range of persimmon extends from Connecticut to Florida, and westward to Iowa, Missouri, and Texas. It reaches its largest size in the South. It is of vigorous growth, spreading by means of seeds, and also by roots. The latter is the most common method where the ground is open. Such situations as old, abandoned fields invite the spread of persimmons. Roots ramify under the ground, and sprouts spring up, often producing thickets of an acre or more. Trees do not generally reach large size if they grow in that way, but their crowded condition does not make them fruitless as can be attested to by many a boy who penetratesthe persimmon thickets by means of devious paths that wind with many a labyrinthic turn which takes in all that is worth finding.The variation in the quality of persimmons is greater than that of most wild fruits. Nature usually sets a standard and sticks closely to it, but the rule is not adhered to in the case of persimmons. Some are twice as large as others; some are never fit to eat, no matter how severely or how often they are frosted; others require at least one fierce frost to soften their austerity; but some may be eaten with relish without the ameliorating influence of frost.The austerity of a green persimmon is due to tannin. It is supposed that cultivation might remove some of this objectionable quality, but no great success has thus far attended efforts in that direction. Japanese persimmons, which are of a different species, are cultivated with success in California.The sizes of persimmon trees vary according to soil, climate, and situation. They average rather small, but occasionally reach a height of 100 feet and a diameter of nearly two. Mature trunks are usually little over twelve inches in diameter, and many never reach that size.The dry wood weighs 49.28 pounds per cubic foot, which is about the weight of hickory. It is hard, strong, compact, and is susceptible of a high polish. The yearly rings are marked by one or more bands of open ducts, and scattered ducts occur in the rest of the wood. The medullary rays are thin and inconspicuous; color of heartwood dark brown, often nearly black; the sapwood is light brown, and frequently contains darker spots.The value of persimmon depends largely upon the proportion of sapwood to heartwood. That was the case formerly more than it is now; for until recent years the heartwood of persimmon was generally thrown away, and the sapwood only was wanted; but demand for the heart has recently increased. There is much difference in the proportion of heartwood to sapwood in different trees. It does not seem to be a matter of size, nor wholly of age. Small trunks sometimes have more heart than large ones. A tree a hundred years old may have heartwood scarcely larger than a lead pencil, and occasionally there is none. In other instances the heart is comparatively large.Persimmon has never been a wood of many uses, as hickory and oak have been. In early times it was considered valuable almost wholly on account of its fruit, and that had no commercial value, as it was seldom offered for sale in the market. In the language of the southern negroes who fully appreciated the fruit, it was “something good to run at”—meaning that the ripe persimmons were gathered and eaten from the trees while they lasted, but that few were preserved.It is recorded that the “small wheel” of the pioneer cabins was occasionally made of persimmon wood. The wheel so designated was the machine on which wool and flax were spun by the people in their homes. Spinning wheels were of two kinds, one large, with the operator walking to and fro, the other small, with the operator sitting. It was the small wheel which was sometimes made of persimmon. There is no apparent reason why it should have been made of that wood in preference to any one of a dozen others.The demand for persimmon in a serious way began with its use as shuttles in textile factories. Weavers had made shuttles of it for home use on hand looms for many years before the demand came from power looms where the shuttles were thrown to and fro by machinery. Up to some thirty years ago, shuttles for factories were generally made of Turkish boxwood, but the supply fell short and the advance in price caused a search for substitutes. Two satisfactory shuttlewoods were found in this country, persimmon and dogwood. The demand came not only from textile mills in America but from those of Europe. The manufacture of shuttle blocks became an industry of considerable importance.Persimmon wood is suitable for shuttles because it wears smooth, is hard, strong, tough, and of proper weight. Most woods that have been tried for this article fail on account of splintering, splitting, quickly wearing out, or wearing rough. The shuttle is not regarded as satisfactory unless it stands 1,000 hours of actual work. Some woods which are satisfactory for many other purposes will not last an hour as a shuttle.The manufacture of shuttles, after the square has been roughed out, requires twenty-two operations. Probably more shuttlewood comes from Arkansas than from any other section, though a dozen or more states contribute persimmon. The total sawmill cut of this wood in the United States is about 2,500,000 feet, but this does not include that which never passes through a sawmill.The wood has other uses. It has lately met demand from manufacturers of golf heads. Skewers are made of it in North Carolina, and billiard cues and mallets in Massachusetts.The heartwood is dark and shuttle makers and golfhead manufacturers will not have it. Until recently it was customary to throw it away, because no sale for it could be found. It is now known to be suitable for parquet flooring and for brush backs, and the demand for the heartwood is as reliable as for the sapwood. A little of the dark wood is cut in veneer and is employed in panel work, and other is used in turnery.The seeds of persimmon furnished one of the early substitutes for coffee in backwoods settlements when the genuine article could not be obtained. They were parched and pounded until sufficiently pulverized. During the Civil war many a confederate camp in the South was fragrant with the aroma of persimmon seed coffee, after the soldiers had added the fruit to their rations of cornbread.Mexican Persimmon(Diospyros texana) grows in Texas and Mexico. It is most abundant in southern and western Texas, where it suits itself to different soils, is found on rich moist ground near the borders of prairies, and also in rocky canyons and dry mesas. The largest trees are fifty feet high and twenty inches in diameter, but trunks that large are not abundant. The tree differs from the eastern persimmon in that the sapwood is thinner, and the heartwood makes up a much greater proportion of the trunk; the uses are consequently different, since it is taken for its dark wood, the eastern tree for its light-colored sap. The fruit of the Mexican persimmon is little esteemed. It is small, black, and the thin layer of pulp between the skin and the seed is insipid. Until fully ripe it is exceedingly austere. The Mexicans in the Rio Grande valley make a dye of the persimmons and use it to color sheep skins. The fruit’s supply of tannin probably contributes to the tanning as well as the dyeing of the sheep pelts. The wood is heavier than eastern persimmon, and has more than three fold more ashes in a cord of wood, amounting to about 160 pounds. The bark is thin and the trunk gnarled. The dark color of the wood gives it the name black persimmon in Texas. Mexicans call it chapote. Sargent pronounces it the best American substitute for boxwood for engraving purposes, but it does not appear to be used outside of Texas. The wood is irregular in color, even in the same piece, being variegated with lighter and darker streaks, and cloudy effects. It ought to be fine brush-back material. It is worked into tool handles, lodge furniture, canes, rules, pen holders, picture frames, curtain rings, door knobs, parasol handles, and maul sticks for artists.Persimmon branch

Persimmon belongs to the ebony family, and the family has contributed to the civilization of the human race since very early times. Some of the oldest furniture in existence, that which was found hidden in the ruins of ancient Egypt, is ebony, and there is evidence among the old records in the land of the Nile that the Egyptians made voyages southward through the Red sea and brought back cargoes of ebony from Punt, a region in eastern Africa. The name ebony is believed to be derived from a Hebrew word, probably brought to Palestine by some of Solomon’s captains who traded along the south coast of Asia or the east coast of Africa about the time of the building of the first temple. The botanical name for the genus (diospyros) is made up of two words meaning “Jupiter’s wheat”—supposed to be a reference to the value of persimmons as food. The name, however, is not as old as the Hebrew word, nor is the Hebrew as old as the references to ebony in the records of Egypt. A piece of the old furniture—not less than 4,000 years old—is still in existence. It probably matches in age the cedar of Lebanon coffins in the oldest Egyptian tombs.

The ebony family consists of five genera, one of which is persimmon (diospyros). This genus consists of 160 species, only two of them in the United States. Thus the persimmon trees of this country are a very small part of the family to which they belong, but they are a highly respectable part of it. The word persimmon is of Indian origin, and was used by the tribes near the Atlantic coast. The original spelling was “pessimin,” and that was probably about the pronunciation given it by the aborigines.

It has never been called by many names. It is known as date plum in New Jersey and Tennessee, and as possumwood in Florida. The avidity with which opossums feed on the fruit is responsible for the name.

The range of persimmon extends from Connecticut to Florida, and westward to Iowa, Missouri, and Texas. It reaches its largest size in the South. It is of vigorous growth, spreading by means of seeds, and also by roots. The latter is the most common method where the ground is open. Such situations as old, abandoned fields invite the spread of persimmons. Roots ramify under the ground, and sprouts spring up, often producing thickets of an acre or more. Trees do not generally reach large size if they grow in that way, but their crowded condition does not make them fruitless as can be attested to by many a boy who penetratesthe persimmon thickets by means of devious paths that wind with many a labyrinthic turn which takes in all that is worth finding.

The variation in the quality of persimmons is greater than that of most wild fruits. Nature usually sets a standard and sticks closely to it, but the rule is not adhered to in the case of persimmons. Some are twice as large as others; some are never fit to eat, no matter how severely or how often they are frosted; others require at least one fierce frost to soften their austerity; but some may be eaten with relish without the ameliorating influence of frost.

The austerity of a green persimmon is due to tannin. It is supposed that cultivation might remove some of this objectionable quality, but no great success has thus far attended efforts in that direction. Japanese persimmons, which are of a different species, are cultivated with success in California.

The sizes of persimmon trees vary according to soil, climate, and situation. They average rather small, but occasionally reach a height of 100 feet and a diameter of nearly two. Mature trunks are usually little over twelve inches in diameter, and many never reach that size.

The dry wood weighs 49.28 pounds per cubic foot, which is about the weight of hickory. It is hard, strong, compact, and is susceptible of a high polish. The yearly rings are marked by one or more bands of open ducts, and scattered ducts occur in the rest of the wood. The medullary rays are thin and inconspicuous; color of heartwood dark brown, often nearly black; the sapwood is light brown, and frequently contains darker spots.

The value of persimmon depends largely upon the proportion of sapwood to heartwood. That was the case formerly more than it is now; for until recent years the heartwood of persimmon was generally thrown away, and the sapwood only was wanted; but demand for the heart has recently increased. There is much difference in the proportion of heartwood to sapwood in different trees. It does not seem to be a matter of size, nor wholly of age. Small trunks sometimes have more heart than large ones. A tree a hundred years old may have heartwood scarcely larger than a lead pencil, and occasionally there is none. In other instances the heart is comparatively large.

Persimmon has never been a wood of many uses, as hickory and oak have been. In early times it was considered valuable almost wholly on account of its fruit, and that had no commercial value, as it was seldom offered for sale in the market. In the language of the southern negroes who fully appreciated the fruit, it was “something good to run at”—meaning that the ripe persimmons were gathered and eaten from the trees while they lasted, but that few were preserved.

It is recorded that the “small wheel” of the pioneer cabins was occasionally made of persimmon wood. The wheel so designated was the machine on which wool and flax were spun by the people in their homes. Spinning wheels were of two kinds, one large, with the operator walking to and fro, the other small, with the operator sitting. It was the small wheel which was sometimes made of persimmon. There is no apparent reason why it should have been made of that wood in preference to any one of a dozen others.

The demand for persimmon in a serious way began with its use as shuttles in textile factories. Weavers had made shuttles of it for home use on hand looms for many years before the demand came from power looms where the shuttles were thrown to and fro by machinery. Up to some thirty years ago, shuttles for factories were generally made of Turkish boxwood, but the supply fell short and the advance in price caused a search for substitutes. Two satisfactory shuttlewoods were found in this country, persimmon and dogwood. The demand came not only from textile mills in America but from those of Europe. The manufacture of shuttle blocks became an industry of considerable importance.

Persimmon wood is suitable for shuttles because it wears smooth, is hard, strong, tough, and of proper weight. Most woods that have been tried for this article fail on account of splintering, splitting, quickly wearing out, or wearing rough. The shuttle is not regarded as satisfactory unless it stands 1,000 hours of actual work. Some woods which are satisfactory for many other purposes will not last an hour as a shuttle.

The manufacture of shuttles, after the square has been roughed out, requires twenty-two operations. Probably more shuttlewood comes from Arkansas than from any other section, though a dozen or more states contribute persimmon. The total sawmill cut of this wood in the United States is about 2,500,000 feet, but this does not include that which never passes through a sawmill.

The wood has other uses. It has lately met demand from manufacturers of golf heads. Skewers are made of it in North Carolina, and billiard cues and mallets in Massachusetts.

The heartwood is dark and shuttle makers and golfhead manufacturers will not have it. Until recently it was customary to throw it away, because no sale for it could be found. It is now known to be suitable for parquet flooring and for brush backs, and the demand for the heartwood is as reliable as for the sapwood. A little of the dark wood is cut in veneer and is employed in panel work, and other is used in turnery.

The seeds of persimmon furnished one of the early substitutes for coffee in backwoods settlements when the genuine article could not be obtained. They were parched and pounded until sufficiently pulverized. During the Civil war many a confederate camp in the South was fragrant with the aroma of persimmon seed coffee, after the soldiers had added the fruit to their rations of cornbread.

Mexican Persimmon(Diospyros texana) grows in Texas and Mexico. It is most abundant in southern and western Texas, where it suits itself to different soils, is found on rich moist ground near the borders of prairies, and also in rocky canyons and dry mesas. The largest trees are fifty feet high and twenty inches in diameter, but trunks that large are not abundant. The tree differs from the eastern persimmon in that the sapwood is thinner, and the heartwood makes up a much greater proportion of the trunk; the uses are consequently different, since it is taken for its dark wood, the eastern tree for its light-colored sap. The fruit of the Mexican persimmon is little esteemed. It is small, black, and the thin layer of pulp between the skin and the seed is insipid. Until fully ripe it is exceedingly austere. The Mexicans in the Rio Grande valley make a dye of the persimmons and use it to color sheep skins. The fruit’s supply of tannin probably contributes to the tanning as well as the dyeing of the sheep pelts. The wood is heavier than eastern persimmon, and has more than three fold more ashes in a cord of wood, amounting to about 160 pounds. The bark is thin and the trunk gnarled. The dark color of the wood gives it the name black persimmon in Texas. Mexicans call it chapote. Sargent pronounces it the best American substitute for boxwood for engraving purposes, but it does not appear to be used outside of Texas. The wood is irregular in color, even in the same piece, being variegated with lighter and darker streaks, and cloudy effects. It ought to be fine brush-back material. It is worked into tool handles, lodge furniture, canes, rules, pen holders, picture frames, curtain rings, door knobs, parasol handles, and maul sticks for artists.

Persimmon branch

FLOWERING DOGWOODFlowering dogwoodFlowering Dogwood

Flowering dogwoodFlowering Dogwood

Flowering Dogwood

FLOWERING DOGWOOD(Cornus Florida)The dogwood or cornel family is old but not numerous. It originated several hundred thousand years ago and spread over much of the world, but preferred the temperate latitudes. One species at least crossed the equator and established itself in the highlands of Peru. There are forty or fifty species in all, about one-third of them in the United States, but most are shrubs. Black gum and tupelo are members of the family, and are giants compared with the dogwoods. In Europe the tree is usually called cornel, and that has been made the family name. It is a very old word, coined by the Romans before the days of Caesar. They so named it because it was hard like horn (cornusmeaning horn in the Latin language). They used it as shafts of spears, and so common was that use that when a speaker referred to a spear he simply called it by the name of the wood of the handle or shaft, as when Virgil described a combat which was supposed to have occurred 800 years before the Christian era, and used the words: “Clogged in the wound the Italiancornelstood.”The qualities of this wood which led to important uses among the Romans, have always made dogwood a valuable material. Civilized nations do not need it for spear shafts, but they have other demands which call for large amounts.The flowering dogwood has other names in this country. It is generally known simply as dogwood, but it is called boxwood in Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Mississippi, Michigan, Kentucky, and Indiana; false box-dogwood in Kentucky; New England boxwood in Tennessee; flowering cornel in Rhode Island; and cornel in Texas.Its range extends from Massachusetts through Ontario and Michigan to Missouri, south to Florida, and west to Texas. The area where it grows includes about 800,000 square miles. It is most common and of largest size in the South, comparatively rare in the North, generally occurs in the shade of taller trees, and prefers well-drained soil, but is not particular whether it is fertile or thin.The dogwood is valuable as ornament and for its wood. It was formerly a source of medicine, from roots, bark, and flowers; but it seems to have been largely displaced by other drugs; was once considered a good substitute for quinine, that use having been learned from Indian doctors. The Indians dug roots for a scarlet dye with which the vain warrior stained escutcheons on buckskin, and colored porcupine quills and bald eagle feathers for decorating his moccasins and his hair.The dogwood varies in size from a shrub with many branches to a tree forty feet high, eighteen inches in diameter, and with a flat but shapely crown. The trunk rises as a shaft with little taper, until the first branches are reached. All the branches start at the same place, and the trunk ends abruptly—divides into branches. Flowers are an important part of the tree, as might be inferred from the prominence given them in the tree’s names. In the South the flowers appear in March, in the North in May, and in both regions before the opening of the leaves. The flowers on vigorous trees are three or four inches across, white, and very showy. A dogwood tree in full bloom against a hillside in spring is a most conspicuous object, and is justly admired by all who have appreciation of beauty. The flowers fall as leaves appear, and for some months the tree occupies its little space in the forest unobserved; but in the autumn it bursts again into glory, and while not quite as conspicuous an object as when in bloom, it is no less worthy of admiration. The fall of the leaves reveals the brilliant scarlet fruit which ladens the branches. The berries are just large enough for a good mouthful for a bird, but birds spare them until fully ripe to the harvest, and they then harvest them very rapidly. The tree is thus permitted to display its fruit a considerable time before yielding it to the feathered inhabitants of the air whose mission in forest economy is to scatter the seeds of trees, when nature provides the seeds themselves with no wings for flying.The two periods in the year when dogwood is highly ornamental, the flowers in spring before leaves appear, and fruit in autumn after leaves fall, are responsible for this tree’s importance in ornamental planting. It is a common park tree, but it is small, generally not more than fifteen feet high, and it occupies subordinate places in the plans of the landscape garden. It is a filler between oaks, pines, and spruces, and it passes unnoticed, except when in bloom and in fruit.Dogwood is about four pounds per cubic foot heavier than white oak, has the same breaking strength, and is lower in elasticity. It is quite commonly believed that this tree has no heartwood, but the belief is erroneous. It seldom has much, and small trunks often none; but when dogwood reaches maturity it develops heart. Sometimes the heartwood is no larger than a lead pencil in trunks forty or fifty years old. The heart is brown, sapwood is white, and is the part wanted by the users of dogwood. Annual rings are obscure and it is a tree of slow growth. The wood is as nearly without figure as any in this country. It seldom or never goes to sawmills. The logs are too small. Most of the supply is bought by manufacturers of shuttles and golf stick heads, in this country and Europe. They purchase it by the cord or piece. It does not figure much in any part of the lumber business, but is cut andmarketed in ways peculiar to itself. Log cutters in hardwood forests pay little attention to it. The dogwood harvest comes principally from southern states. Village merchants are the chief collectors, and they sell to contractors who ship to buyers in the manufacturing centers. The village merchants buy from farmers, who cut a stick here and there as they find it in woodlots, forests, or by the wayside, on their own land or somebody else’s. When the cutter next drives to town he throws his few dogwoods in the wagon, and trades them to the store keeper for groceries or other merchandise. It is small business, but in the aggregate it brings together enough dogwood to supply the trade.Dogwood has many uses, but none other approaches shuttle making and golfhead manufacture in importance. The wood is made into brush blocks, wedges, engraver’s blocks, tool handles, machinery bearings as a substitute for lignum-vitæ, small hubs, and many kinds of turnery and other small articles.Western Dogwood(Cornus nuttallii) is a larger, taller tree than the eastern flowering dogwood. A height of 100 feet is claimed for it in the low country along the coast of British Columbia, but there are no authentic reports of trees so large anywhere south of the boundary between Canada and the United States. Its height ranges from twenty to fifty feet, and its diameter from six to twenty inches. The appearance is much the same as its eastern relative. Its berries are red, and grow in clusters of forty or less; the bark on old trunks is rough, but is smooth on those of medium size; the flowers are generally described as very large and showy, but the true flower is quite an inconspicuous affair, being a small, greenish-yellow, button-like cluster, surrounded by four or six snowy-white or sometimes pinkish scales which are popularly but erroneously supposed to form a portion of the real flower. The western dogwood in its native forest often puts out flowers in autumn; is well supplied with foliage which assumes red and orange colors in the fall when the showy berries are at their best. However, the tree has not yet won its way into the good graces of landscape gardeners, and has not been much planted in parks. It wants some of the good points possessed by the flowering dogwood. The western tree shows to best advantage in its native forest where it thrives on gentle mountain slopes and in low bottoms, valleys, and gulches, provided the soil is well drained and rich. It runs southward fifteen hundred miles from Vancouver island to southern California. It cares little for sunshine, and often is found growing nicely in dense shade. Seedlings do better where shade is deep. The wood is lighter but somewhat stronger than that of the flowering dogwood; is pale reddish-brown, with thick sapwood; is hard, and checks badly in seasoning. Mature trees are from 100 to 150 years.Blue Dogwood(Cornus alternifolia) is given that name because of the blue fruit it bears. It has a number of other names, among them being purple dogwood, green osier, umbrella tree, pigeonberry, and alternate-leaved dogwood, the last being simply a translation of its botanical name. It grows in more northern latitudes than the flowering dogwood, and does not range as far south. It is found from Nova Scotia to Alabama, and westward to Minnesota, but its southern habitat lies along the Appalachian mountain ranges. It attains size and assumes form similar to the flowering dogwood. The wood is heavy, hard, brown, tinged with red, the sapwood white. It is a deep forest tree, but has been domesticated in a few instances where it has been planted as ornament. The wood seems to possess the good qualities of flowering dogwood, but no reports of uses for it have been made.Two varieties of flowering dogwood have been produced by cultivation, weeping dogwood (Cornus florida pendula), and red-bract dogwood (Cornus florida rubra). English cornel or dogwood (Cornus mas) has been planted in many parts of this country. The so-called Jamaica dogwood is not in the dogwood family.Andromeda(Andromeda ferruginea) is a small southern tree of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and in the latter state is sometimes known as titi, though other trees also bear that name. The largest are thirty feet high, if by chance one can be found standing erect, for most of them prefer to sprawl at full length on the ground. The fruit is a small berry of no value. The wood is weak, but hard and sufficiently compact to receive fine polish. The heartwood is light brown, tinged with red.Flowering dogwood branch

The dogwood or cornel family is old but not numerous. It originated several hundred thousand years ago and spread over much of the world, but preferred the temperate latitudes. One species at least crossed the equator and established itself in the highlands of Peru. There are forty or fifty species in all, about one-third of them in the United States, but most are shrubs. Black gum and tupelo are members of the family, and are giants compared with the dogwoods. In Europe the tree is usually called cornel, and that has been made the family name. It is a very old word, coined by the Romans before the days of Caesar. They so named it because it was hard like horn (cornusmeaning horn in the Latin language). They used it as shafts of spears, and so common was that use that when a speaker referred to a spear he simply called it by the name of the wood of the handle or shaft, as when Virgil described a combat which was supposed to have occurred 800 years before the Christian era, and used the words: “Clogged in the wound the Italiancornelstood.”

The qualities of this wood which led to important uses among the Romans, have always made dogwood a valuable material. Civilized nations do not need it for spear shafts, but they have other demands which call for large amounts.

The flowering dogwood has other names in this country. It is generally known simply as dogwood, but it is called boxwood in Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Mississippi, Michigan, Kentucky, and Indiana; false box-dogwood in Kentucky; New England boxwood in Tennessee; flowering cornel in Rhode Island; and cornel in Texas.

Its range extends from Massachusetts through Ontario and Michigan to Missouri, south to Florida, and west to Texas. The area where it grows includes about 800,000 square miles. It is most common and of largest size in the South, comparatively rare in the North, generally occurs in the shade of taller trees, and prefers well-drained soil, but is not particular whether it is fertile or thin.

The dogwood is valuable as ornament and for its wood. It was formerly a source of medicine, from roots, bark, and flowers; but it seems to have been largely displaced by other drugs; was once considered a good substitute for quinine, that use having been learned from Indian doctors. The Indians dug roots for a scarlet dye with which the vain warrior stained escutcheons on buckskin, and colored porcupine quills and bald eagle feathers for decorating his moccasins and his hair.

The dogwood varies in size from a shrub with many branches to a tree forty feet high, eighteen inches in diameter, and with a flat but shapely crown. The trunk rises as a shaft with little taper, until the first branches are reached. All the branches start at the same place, and the trunk ends abruptly—divides into branches. Flowers are an important part of the tree, as might be inferred from the prominence given them in the tree’s names. In the South the flowers appear in March, in the North in May, and in both regions before the opening of the leaves. The flowers on vigorous trees are three or four inches across, white, and very showy. A dogwood tree in full bloom against a hillside in spring is a most conspicuous object, and is justly admired by all who have appreciation of beauty. The flowers fall as leaves appear, and for some months the tree occupies its little space in the forest unobserved; but in the autumn it bursts again into glory, and while not quite as conspicuous an object as when in bloom, it is no less worthy of admiration. The fall of the leaves reveals the brilliant scarlet fruit which ladens the branches. The berries are just large enough for a good mouthful for a bird, but birds spare them until fully ripe to the harvest, and they then harvest them very rapidly. The tree is thus permitted to display its fruit a considerable time before yielding it to the feathered inhabitants of the air whose mission in forest economy is to scatter the seeds of trees, when nature provides the seeds themselves with no wings for flying.

The two periods in the year when dogwood is highly ornamental, the flowers in spring before leaves appear, and fruit in autumn after leaves fall, are responsible for this tree’s importance in ornamental planting. It is a common park tree, but it is small, generally not more than fifteen feet high, and it occupies subordinate places in the plans of the landscape garden. It is a filler between oaks, pines, and spruces, and it passes unnoticed, except when in bloom and in fruit.

Dogwood is about four pounds per cubic foot heavier than white oak, has the same breaking strength, and is lower in elasticity. It is quite commonly believed that this tree has no heartwood, but the belief is erroneous. It seldom has much, and small trunks often none; but when dogwood reaches maturity it develops heart. Sometimes the heartwood is no larger than a lead pencil in trunks forty or fifty years old. The heart is brown, sapwood is white, and is the part wanted by the users of dogwood. Annual rings are obscure and it is a tree of slow growth. The wood is as nearly without figure as any in this country. It seldom or never goes to sawmills. The logs are too small. Most of the supply is bought by manufacturers of shuttles and golf stick heads, in this country and Europe. They purchase it by the cord or piece. It does not figure much in any part of the lumber business, but is cut andmarketed in ways peculiar to itself. Log cutters in hardwood forests pay little attention to it. The dogwood harvest comes principally from southern states. Village merchants are the chief collectors, and they sell to contractors who ship to buyers in the manufacturing centers. The village merchants buy from farmers, who cut a stick here and there as they find it in woodlots, forests, or by the wayside, on their own land or somebody else’s. When the cutter next drives to town he throws his few dogwoods in the wagon, and trades them to the store keeper for groceries or other merchandise. It is small business, but in the aggregate it brings together enough dogwood to supply the trade.

Dogwood has many uses, but none other approaches shuttle making and golfhead manufacture in importance. The wood is made into brush blocks, wedges, engraver’s blocks, tool handles, machinery bearings as a substitute for lignum-vitæ, small hubs, and many kinds of turnery and other small articles.

Western Dogwood(Cornus nuttallii) is a larger, taller tree than the eastern flowering dogwood. A height of 100 feet is claimed for it in the low country along the coast of British Columbia, but there are no authentic reports of trees so large anywhere south of the boundary between Canada and the United States. Its height ranges from twenty to fifty feet, and its diameter from six to twenty inches. The appearance is much the same as its eastern relative. Its berries are red, and grow in clusters of forty or less; the bark on old trunks is rough, but is smooth on those of medium size; the flowers are generally described as very large and showy, but the true flower is quite an inconspicuous affair, being a small, greenish-yellow, button-like cluster, surrounded by four or six snowy-white or sometimes pinkish scales which are popularly but erroneously supposed to form a portion of the real flower. The western dogwood in its native forest often puts out flowers in autumn; is well supplied with foliage which assumes red and orange colors in the fall when the showy berries are at their best. However, the tree has not yet won its way into the good graces of landscape gardeners, and has not been much planted in parks. It wants some of the good points possessed by the flowering dogwood. The western tree shows to best advantage in its native forest where it thrives on gentle mountain slopes and in low bottoms, valleys, and gulches, provided the soil is well drained and rich. It runs southward fifteen hundred miles from Vancouver island to southern California. It cares little for sunshine, and often is found growing nicely in dense shade. Seedlings do better where shade is deep. The wood is lighter but somewhat stronger than that of the flowering dogwood; is pale reddish-brown, with thick sapwood; is hard, and checks badly in seasoning. Mature trees are from 100 to 150 years.

Blue Dogwood(Cornus alternifolia) is given that name because of the blue fruit it bears. It has a number of other names, among them being purple dogwood, green osier, umbrella tree, pigeonberry, and alternate-leaved dogwood, the last being simply a translation of its botanical name. It grows in more northern latitudes than the flowering dogwood, and does not range as far south. It is found from Nova Scotia to Alabama, and westward to Minnesota, but its southern habitat lies along the Appalachian mountain ranges. It attains size and assumes form similar to the flowering dogwood. The wood is heavy, hard, brown, tinged with red, the sapwood white. It is a deep forest tree, but has been domesticated in a few instances where it has been planted as ornament. The wood seems to possess the good qualities of flowering dogwood, but no reports of uses for it have been made.

Two varieties of flowering dogwood have been produced by cultivation, weeping dogwood (Cornus florida pendula), and red-bract dogwood (Cornus florida rubra). English cornel or dogwood (Cornus mas) has been planted in many parts of this country. The so-called Jamaica dogwood is not in the dogwood family.

Andromeda(Andromeda ferruginea) is a small southern tree of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and in the latter state is sometimes known as titi, though other trees also bear that name. The largest are thirty feet high, if by chance one can be found standing erect, for most of them prefer to sprawl at full length on the ground. The fruit is a small berry of no value. The wood is weak, but hard and sufficiently compact to receive fine polish. The heartwood is light brown, tinged with red.

Andromeda(Andromeda ferruginea) is a small southern tree of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and in the latter state is sometimes known as titi, though other trees also bear that name. The largest are thirty feet high, if by chance one can be found standing erect, for most of them prefer to sprawl at full length on the ground. The fruit is a small berry of no value. The wood is weak, but hard and sufficiently compact to receive fine polish. The heartwood is light brown, tinged with red.

Flowering dogwood branch

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