THE NORWAY SPRUCE.
[Abies[T] excelsa. Nat. Ord.—Coniferæ; Linn.—Monœc. Mon.]
[T] Generic characters. Flowers monœcious. Barren catkins crowded, racemose. Scales of the cone thinned away to the edge, and usually membranous or coriaceous. Leaves never fascicled.
Though a native of the mountains of Europe and Asia in similar parallels of latitude, the Spruce Fir is not considered indigenous to Britain. It must, however, have been introduced at an early period, as it is mentioned by our oldest writers on arboriculture. It is most common in Lapland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and throughout the north of Germany. It grows in the south of Norway at an elevation of 3000 feet above the level of the sea, and in the north on mountains in 70° N. lat. at 750 feet. In the valleys of the Swiss Alps, the Spruce is frequently found above one hundred and fifty feet in height, with trunks from four to five feet in diameter. This tree requires a soft moist soil. Among dry rocks and stones, where the Scotch fir would flourish, the Spruce Fir will scarcely grow.
The Norway Spruce Fir is the loftiest of European trees, attaining, in favourable situations, the enormous height of one hundred and eighty feet; with a very straight upright trunk, from two to six feet in diameter, and widely extending branches, which spread out regularly on every side, so as to form a cone-like or pyramidal shape, terminating in a straight arrow-like leading shoot. In young trees, the branches are disposed in regular whorls from the base to the summit; but in old trees the lower branches drop off. The trunk is covered with a thin bark, of a reddish colour and scaly surface, with occasional warts or small excrescences distributed over its surface. The leaves are solitary, of a dark grassy green, generally under one inch in length, straight, stiff, and sharp-pointed, disposed around the shoots, and more crowded together laterally than on the upper and under sides of the branchlets. The barren flowers, about one inch long, are cylindrical, on long catkins, curved, of a yellowish colour, with red tips, and discharging, when expanded, a profusion of yellow pollen. The fertile flowers are produced at the ends of the branches, first appearing as small pointed purplish-red catkins; they afterwards gradually assume the cone-like form, and become pendant, changing first into a green and latterly into a reddish brown, acquiring a length of from five to seven inches, and a breadth of above two inches. The scales are rhomboidal, slightly incurved, and rugged or toothed at the tip, with two seeds in each scale. The seeds, which are very small, and furnished with large membranous wings, are not shed till the spring of the second year.
Foliage and Cones of A. excelsa.
As an ornamental tree, all admirers of regularity and symmetry are generally partial to the Spruce. Gilpin was, however, no great admirer of the tree; but still he allows it to have had its peculiar beauties. "The Spruce Fir," he says, "is generally esteemed a more elegant tree than the Scotch pine; and the reason, I suppose, is because it often feathers to the ground, and grows in a more exact and regular shape: but this is a principal objection to it. It often wants both form and beauty. We admire its floating foliage, in which it sometimes exceeds all other trees; but it is rather disagreeable to see a repetition of these feathery strata, beautiful as they are, reared tier above tier, in regular order, from the bottom of a tree to the top. Its perpendicular stem, also, which has seldom any lineal variety, makes the appearance of the tree still more formal. It is not always, however, that the Spruce Fir grows with so much regularity. Sometimes a lateral branch, here and there taking the lead beyond the rest, breaks somewhat through the order commonly observed, and forms a few chasms, which have a good effect. When this is the case, the Spruce Fir ranks among picturesque trees. Sometimes it has as good an effect, and in many circumstances a better, when the contrast appears still stronger; when the tree is shattered by some accident, has lost many of its branches, and is scathed and ragged. A feathery branch, here and there, among broken stems, has often an admirable effect; but it must arise from some particular situation. In all circumstances, however, the Spruce Fir appears best either as a single tree, or unmixed with any of its fellows; for neither it, nor any of the spear-headed race, will ever form a beautiful clump without the assistance of other trees."
The Spruce Fir is raised from seed, which should be chosen from healthy vigorous trees. The young plant appears with from seven to nine cotyledons, but makes little progress till after the third year, when it begins to put out lateral branches. Its progress from this time, till its fifth or sixth year, is at the annual rate of about six inches, after which age its annual growth, in favourable soils, is very rapid, the leading shoot being frequently from two to three feet in length, and this increase it continues to support with undiminished vigour for forty or fifty years, many trees within that period attaining a height of from sixty to eighty feet. Its growth after this period is slower, and the duration of the tree, in its native habitats, is considered to range between one hundred and one hundred and fifty years.
