Manual of the Trees of North America (Exclusive of Mexico) 2nd ed.Sargent, Charles Sprague
Science
Manual of the Trees of North America (Exclusive of Mexico) 2nd ed.
Sargent, Charles Sprague
Trees -- North America
Distribution. Mountain slopes and high prairies of western Idaho and of
eastern Washington to the eastern slopes of the Cascade Mountains;
eastern and southern Oregon up to altitudes of 4500°; along the summits
and upper slopes of the Sierra Nevada of California, and southward to
the San Bernardino Mountains, here abundant in Bear and Holcomb valleys;
attaining its greatest trunk diameter on the wind-swept peaks of the
California sierras, usually at altitudes between 6000° and 10,000° above
the sea.
8. Juniperus monosperma Sarg. Juniper.
[Illustration: Fig. 85]
Leaves opposite or ternate, often slightly spreading at apex, acute or
occasionally acuminate, much thickened and rounded on the back, usually
glandular, denticulately fringed, gray-green, rather less than ⅛′ long,
turning bright red-brown before falling; on vigorous shoots and young
plants ovate, acute, tipped with long rigid points, thin, conspicuously
glandular on the back, often ½′ long. Flowers: male with 8—10 stamens,
their broadly ovate, rounded or pointed connectives slightly erose on
the margins: female with spreading pointed scales. Fruit subglobose or
short-oblong, ⅛′—¼′ long, dark blue or perhaps occasionally light
chestnut-brown with a thick firm skin covered with a thin glaucous
bloom, thin flesh, and 1 or rarely 2 seeds; seeds often protruding from
the top of the fruit, ovoid, often 4-angled, somewhat obtuse at apex,
with a small hilum, and 2 cotyledons.
A tree, occasionally 40°—50° high, with a stout much-lobed and
buttressed trunk sometimes 3° in diameter, short stout branches forming
an open very irregular head, and slender branchlets covered after the
falling of the leaves with light red-brown bark spreading freely into
thin loose scales; more often a much branched shrub sometimes only a few
feet high. Bark ashy gray, divided into irregularly connected ridges,
separating into long narrow persistent shreddy scales. Wood heavy,
slightly fragrant, light reddish brown, with nearly white sapwood and
eccentric layers of annual growth; largely used for fencing and fuel.
The fruit is ground into flour and baked by the Indians, who use the
thin strips of fibrous bark in making saddles, breechcloths, and
sleeping-mats.
Distribution. Along the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains from the
valley of the Platte River, Wyoming (near Alcova, Natrona County) and
the divide between the Platte and Arkansas rivers in Colorado; western
Oklahoma (near Kenton, Cimarron County, common) and western Texas; on
the Colorado plateau, northern Arizona; over the mountain ranges of
southwestern Wyoming, Nevada, southern New Mexico and Arizona, and
southward into northern Mexico; often covering, with the Nut Pine, in
southern Colorado and Utah, and in northern and central New Mexico and
Arizona, great areas of rolling hills 6000°—7000° above the sea-level;
reaching its largest size in northern Arizona.
9. Juniperus mexicana Spreng. Cedar. Rock Cedar.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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