De I. VNER VEW D Forest Trees of the Pacific Slope

132 FOREST TREES OF THE PACIFIC SLOPE.
years old often bear cones, but seed is produced mainly by older and mature trees. Seed
production appears to increase with age and to be maintained to great age. Seed of low
germination (40 to 50 per cent), and of very transient vitality; much of it destroyed by
an insect and eaten by squirrels. Seed germinates freely and seedlings grow well on any
moist humus or mineral soil in the open or in moderate shade; seedlings do not thrive
In shade of mother trees. Openings made near seed trees are readily restocked.
Red Fir.
Abies magnifica Murray.
DISTINOGUISHING CHARACTERISTICS.
The common name of red fir is appropriately chosen in reference to the deep
red-brown bark which it almost invariably has throughout its range. It is a
stately tree when fully grown, commonly from 125 to 175 feet high, very exceptionally
200 feet or more, and from 30 to 50 inches in diameter; trees from 60
to 80 inches in diameter are rather rare. Much larger trees are said to have
been found, but the writer has never seen them. At high elevations, much
exposed to heavy winds, it is very often from 40 to 80 feet high and from 20 to
30 inches in diameter, or smaller. In close stands the straight, slightly tapering
trunks are clear of branches for 60 or 80 feet or more. On high exposed slopes,
smaller trees are often conspicuously bent down the slope at their base, as a
result of heavy snows which yearly bend the seedlings to the ground. Their
struggle to become upright with each year's growth never wholly rids them of
the mark of early vicissitudes. The crown of old forest grown trees is a short,
very narrow, round-topped cone, sometimes almost cylindrical. The short
branches droop except at the top of the crown, where they trend upward. It
has an open head, due to the distances between the regular whorls of
branches. Only in the densest stands are medium-sized trees clear of branches
for half or more of their length. In the high, fairly dense slope forests many
trees bear straggling branches nearly to the ground. Here, too, the brittle tops
are often broken off by wind, when the lost member is replaced by the upward
growth of one or two side branches, which soon assume the form and place of
leaders. Broken and repaired crowns of this type are familiar sights on windswept
slopes inhabited by this fir. Young trees (30 to 50 years old and as many
feet high) have narrow, cylindrical, sharp-pointed crowns, touching the ground.
All of the regular groups of branches, except the topmost, sweep down and
upward at their ends in graceful curves, presenting a form which is unsurpassed
in beauty and symmetry by any other of our conifers. The bark, smooth
and conspicuously chalky white on young trees and on the upper stem and
branches of old trees, is from 2 to 3 inches thick on large trees; its hard, rough,
deep furrows and narrow, rounded ridges are very distinctive. The latter are
irregularly divided by diagonal furrows, which give a peculiar diagonal and
vertical or zig-zag trend to the ridges. No other tree in the habitat of this fir
has bark in any way similar.
The dense foliage is dark blue-green, with a whitish tinge; new leaves of the
season are much lighter green and conspicuously whitened. The leaves are 4angled
with nearly equal sides, the angle on the upper sides of the leaves being
rounded. Leaves of the lower branches (fig. 52) are flatter than those from
other parts of the crown. They are bent from the lower side of the branches
so that they appear to grow from the top of the branch, mainly in two dense
upright lines; all are more or less curved. Lower leaves, from three-fourths
inch to about 1* inches long, are blunt and wider at their ends than at their
bases. Leaves of the upper crown branches (fig. 53), five-eighths inch to about
1j inches long, are most strongly 4-sided, stouter than those below, conspicu-