Box 22, Folder 8: Trees of Wisconsin 1859, 1867

207. Communications.

near rocks, &c. It makes rather an ornamental appearance, the numerous racemes of flowers standing erect above the leaves, are soon followed by the bright red fruit. I am not aware of any useful purpose to which it has been applied. The Mountain Maple is found in the forests throughout this State; but as it has not been detected in Illinois, we are probably on its southern geographical limits. It extends eastward to Maine, but its western limits are not known. The leaves assume a yellowish red color in autumn, adding much to the beauty and interest of the species for ornamental purposes. The young twigs are bright green; the bark of the trunk, bright gray. The flowers appear in May, and the seed with slightly diverging wings resemble those of the sugar maple in form, but are much smaller, more delicate, and of a very different color. The figure of the leaf is half the natural size; of the fruit, the full size.

4. Acer Saccharinum, of Wangenheim.-Sugar Maple.

This well known and highly valuable tree forms dense groves in many places, but more especially in the eastern and northern parts of the State. Some of these groves, called "maple openings", are among the most beautiful and interesting of our forest scenery. These groves often occupy the sites of deserted Indian villages, being the first to take possession of the abandoned grounds. The wood is in great demand for various useful and ornamental purposes; and thousands of the trees are annually "tapped" to draw sap for the manufacture of "maple sugar." Over six hundred thousand pounds of this sugar are annually made in Wisconsin.

208. Wisconsin Agriculture.

The Sugar Maple is often, and very deservedly employed as an ornamental tree about the streets of towns and cities; its beauty of form, bright green foliage, and the brilliant autumnal tints assumed by the leaves, are so many very desirable qualities in this fine tree for such purposes. But the slowness of its growth is quite an objection, in this "fast age"; hence, the Sugar Maple should be planted alternately with some more rapidly growing species, that can be cut away when the maple has attained a sufficient size to answer the purpose of ornament and shade. Another very serious objection to this tree is, the temptation recurring every spring to tap it for the sweep sap it then contains, thus materially injuring the tree, and retarding its growth. It is a principle laid down in the books on ornamental and landscape gardening, that all trees having useful qualities should be avoided in making selections for these purposes; thus removing all temptation to destroy the ornamental by converting them into the useful. Though the sap of all the maple family contains sugar, this is the only species that affords it in such abundance as to be of much practical value. The Black Maple (Acer nigrum Michx,) is only a variety of the Sugar Maple, not having permanent characters to distinguish it from that species.

The flower of the Sugar Maple appear in May; and the seeds are ripe in September. The figure represents a leaf and the ripe fruit, both reduced to one half the natural size.

209. Communications.

5. Acer dasycarpum, of Ehrhart.-Silver Maple.

This species of Maple is found growing abundantly along the Mississippi river, in this State, where it is cut with other kinds of wood to supply the numerous steamboats with fuel. It is distinguished from the other species of maple by the flowers being on short pedicels, appearing before the leaves, the small number of stamens (3 to 6); the notches of the leaves are rather acute, deeply cut and toothed; the leaves downy beneath when young, and of a bright silvery color; fruit large, divergent, of a greenish color, and woolly in its young state.

The wood is soft and possesses but little value having very little strength or durability. As an ornamental tree, however, it possesses some good qualities; among them we may mention the beautiful contrast between the deep green of the upper and silvery lower surface of the leaves.

6. Acer rubrum, of Linnaeus.-Red Maple.

This species of maple is too well known to need especial description here. It prefers low, damp situations, along the margins of rivers, &c. but flourishes very well in the higher lands. The brilliant scarlet flowers are among the earliest to appear in the spring, preceding the leaves, and covering the tree as with a beautiful mantle. The young shoots are also red, contrasting finely with the green leaves. It is, therefore, one of our most

Y.

210. Wisconsin Agriculture.

ornamental trees, and is often transplanted to the streets and yards of our towns and cities. The Red Maple is a moderate sized tree, seldom attaining the height of the sugar tree; it has a rapid growth; and the wood, though very valuable, is inferior to that species. The flowers appear in April or May-sometimes even in March-and the fruit ripens in August or about the first of September. The figure represents a small leaf, and the fruit, both of the full size of nature.

7. Negundo aceriodes, of Moench.-Box Elder, or Box Maple.

This tree was placed by Linnaeus under the genus Acer, but later botanists have constructed for it a new genus, (Negundo,) on account, chiefly, of the pinnate leaves, and the want of petals in the flowers. It is quite common along the Mississippi river in this State, and extends eastward as far as the Rock river valley. In the Atlantic States it does not reach north of Pennsylvania; but at the west it is found on the Saskatchawan river, as far as the 54th degree of north latitude. Here, according to Sir John Richardson, the natives make a very dark colored sugar from the sap of this tree.

The Box Elder is a small tree; the foliage and young twigs light green. The growth is quite rapid-fifteen or twenty years being sufficient to bring the tree to maturity. It is deemed quite an ornamental and desirable tree in England, where it was introduced from this country as early as 1618.

211. Communications.

Like the red maple, this tree grows most naturally in the low rich grounds along the margins of rivers; and in such situations it might perhaps be cultivated with profit, on account of its rapid and vigorous growth. The figure shows a leaf which is compound, or pinnate, of one fourth the natural size. Very often, and especially in specimens from further South, there are five leaflets instead of three, as here represented. The fruit is shown of the size of life. The flowers appear in April or May; and the fruit ripens early in the season.

The six species noticed above are all that are known in the northern United States. There are five other species west of the Rocky Mountains, and one in Louisiana.

Order III. Leguminoseae.-The Pea Family.

8. Gymnocladus Canadensis, of Linnaeus.-Kentucky Coffee Tree.

I have never seen this tree growing in Wisconsin; but Dr. P. R. Hoy, of Racine, has detected it on the bottom lands in Green county. This may therefore be deemed to be its extreme northern limit. The Coffee Tree may be known by the very large, twice pinnate leaves, sometimes two to three feet in length, though the leaflets are only from one to two inches long. The bark is very rough, and the branches stout, and abruptly terminated, giving the tree in winter the appearance of a dead stump. From this circumstance, the early French settlers called it Chicot, or the stump tree.

Michaux says "the wood is very compact, and of a rosy hue. The fineness and closeness of its grain fit it for cabinet making, and its strength renders it proper for building. Like the Locust, it has the valuable property of rapidly converting its sap into perfect wood, so that a trunk six inches in diameter has only six lines of sap, and may be employed almost entire."-(N. Am. Sylva, vol. 1, p. 122). It usually grows with a slender trunk, a tree fifty or sixty feet high being only twelve to fifteen inches in diameter. But if separated from the dense forests in which it is usually found, it grows with a spreading head, affording ample shade for a large space of ground, and being altogether a very beautiful object.