Leaves forming great tufts at the ends of the branches, stout, dark green, conspicuously marked on the 3 faces by numerous rows of stomata, 8′—13′ long. Flowers from January to March; male yellow, in short dense heads; female subterminal on long stout peduncles. Fruit broad-ovoid, spreading or reflexed on long stalks, 4′—6′ in length, becoming deep chestnut-brown, with thick scales armed with minute spines; mostly deciduous in their fourth year and in falling leaving a few of the barren scales on the stalk attached to the branch; seeds oval, more or less angled, ¾′—1′ long, dull brown and mottled on the lower side, light yellow-brown on the upper side, with a thick hard shell, nearly surrounded by their dark brown wings often nearly ½′ long. A tree, usually 30°—40° high, with a short trunk about 1° in diameter, or occasionally 50°—60° tall, with a long straight slightly tapering stem 2½° in diameter, stout spreading and often ascending branches, and very stout branchlets bright green in their first season, becoming light purple and covered with a metallic bloom the following year, ultimately nearly black. Bark ¾′—1′ thick, deeply and irregularly divided into broad flat ridges covered by large thin closely appressed light red-brown scales. Wood light, soft, not strong, coarse-grained, light yellow, with thick yellow or nearly white sapwood; occasionally used for fuel. The large edible seeds are gathered in large quantities and are eaten raw or roasted. Distribution. Only in a narrow belt a few miles long on the coast near the mouth of the Soledad River just north of San Diego and on the island of Santa Rosa, California; the least widely distributed Pine-tree of the United States. Now planted in the parks of San Diego, California, and in New Zealand, growing rapidly in cultivation, and promising to attain a much larger size than on its native cliffs. 2. LARIX Adans. Larch.