Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1886 [PAGE 267]

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£59 serious consequences. It is the more lamentable because of the easy identification of the seed of the several species of Ash; no nurseryman need blunder in planting. In a similar way 10,000 seedlings of "black" Sugar Maple (Acer nigrum) were purchased of one nurseryman and a like quantity of ''white" Sugar Maple (Acer Saccharinum) of another. Both proved to be the latter. In this case, however, the distinctions are not so pronounced and the disappointment accordingly less severe. Botanists now usually make the former a variety only of the latter, the recognized difference not being deemed sufficient, for specific distinction. Furthermore there is iittle recognized difference in the trees for timber purposes. When this plantation was commenced, attention had not been called to the fact that there were two kinds of Catalpa, differing from each other in very important particulars for the purpose of timber-growing as wTell as other uses. Whether what is now known as the hardy Catalpa shall be recognized as a distinct species (<7. speciosa, Warder), or not, the difference between this and the typical Catalpa bignouiovles is immense in all matters of practical value.. Unfortunately the latter were used in our first planting. Indeed,, the true western type of this tree, indigenous in the Mississippi Valley, though so much better than the eastern variety, was rarely seen in cultivation even in western localities until within six or eight years. We now know that the two kinds are easily distinguishable, and as the seeds are sufficiently unlike, no further mistake should be made. As the records will show the two kinds give very different results in the plantation. In this connection mention should be made of the difference in varieties of many species of timber trees and of the capital importance of attention to these differences in selections for practical arboriculture. The White Elm (Ulmus Americana) varies so much that woodsmen have several special names for the kinds, some of which are very valuable for certain uses, while others are worthless. The same may be said of Box Elder 9 Tulip I. sp. Poplar (Liriodendron tulijjifera) and Cottonwood. Some differences are due to soil and situation (a thing also worthy of study), but the seed from certain trees gives very different stock from that from certain other trees of the same species; sometimes the varieties grow mixed together in the same region of country, sometimes the distinctions are seen only in trees geographically separated. The socalled Yellow Cottonwood of the Mississippi Valley, the wood of which is readily split and worked, is specifically identical with the almost worthless common Cottonwood (Populus Monilinoides) of our part of the country. As a further contribution to the history of the plantation, extracts from some of the annual reports are here appended together with tables taken from the same. It is interesting to note the estimation placed upon the results at the times reported: