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

188
FOREST TREES OF THE PACIFIC SLOPE.
SEQUOIA. REDWOODS.
The trees composing the Sequoia group are of ancient origin. Remains of at
least two sequoias, from which our species descended, have been found in the
Cretaceous and Tertiary periods, during which time they lived in the Arctic
Zone. Our representatives of the genus are now singularly isolated and are
found almost entirely in the coast mountains and Sierras of California, far from
their nearest relative en this continent-the bald cypress (Taxodium distichum)
of the Southern States. They are the tallest and most massive of our forest
trees. Indeed, one of them is easily the largest conifer in the world, widely and
justly honored as the most remarkable of trees. Unlike many of our other
cone-bearers, their distinguishing features remain unvarying.
On account of the restricted range of the Sierra species especially, much concern
has been expressed regarding the probable extinction of these trees. Great
and seemingly needless destruction has been wrought by fire and ax in these forests
of incomparable grandeur. While it would be a calamity to permit the
total destruction for commercial purposes of trees which number their age by
thousands of years, fear need not be felt that these trees are in danger of actual
extermination for want of natural reproduction. With protection against fires
they perpetuate themselves indefinitely, notwithstanding the popular belief that
at least the Sierra sequoia is not reproducing itself. Some of these magnificent
forests should be preserved untouched as monuments of American respect and
love for nature's noblest legacy. The scientific and educational value of preserving
them is unquestioned. The destruction, for whatever end, of all of the
great trees which it has taken thousands of years to produce could never be
justified in later years.
Sequoias are evergreen trees. The leaves are narrow and lance-shaped,
pointed, and arranged alternately opposite and spreading in two lines from
opposite sides of the branches (fig. 57), or they are scale-like, sharp-pointed,
and closely overlapping each other on the branches (fig. 56). Leaves of this
type are longer, the points spreading on young shoots (fig. 55) and young trees,
forming sprays somewhat similar to those of cedars. The leaves of each season's
growth remain on the branches for three or four years. Flowers of two
sexes, male and female, are borne each on different branches of the same tree.
Both are minute or small, rather inconspicuous, scaly bodies at the ends of
branchlets formed the previous year, and opening very late in winter or in early
spring. The cones are egg-shaped bodies composed of closely packed, woody,
persistent, thick scales, and are from about an inch to 34 inches long (figs. 56,
57). They ripen in one and two seasons, remaining on the trees after opening
(late in autumn) and shedding their seeds. Five to seven seeds, minute, brown,
stiff, wing-margined fiat bodies, are borne closely packed beneath each scale. The
seeds can not be wafted more than a short distance by the wind. Squirrels
cut down and bury thousands of the seed-laden cones, from which, under favorable
conditions of light-an opening in the forest-niany seedlings spring up.
Seed-leaves, 4 to 6. The bark of old trees is enormously thick, red-brown, soft,
and separable in very thin flakes.
The purplish, red-brown wood of the sequoias is light, very soft, straightgrained,
and, except that formed during the first one or two centuries, finegrained,
often exceedingly so. It is remarkably durable under all kinds of
exposure, lasting for very many years without apparent sign of decay. Its
great durability and straight grain and the ease with which it can be split and
otherwise worked have long made it desirable for many commercial purposes.
Its huge, long, clear trunks yield saw-timber so large that it often requires to