Cornell Nature-Study Leaflets / Being a selection, with revision, from the teachers' leaflets, home nature-study lessons, junior naturalist monthlies and other publications from the College of Agriculture, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., 1896-1904

by New York State College of Agriculture

Fig. 205. Slippery Elm. The expression is stiff and hard.

Having observed these points in any tree, compare one kind of tree with another and note how they differ in these features. Compare an apple tree with an elm, an elm with a maple, a basswood with a pine, a poplar with a beech, a pear tree with a peach tree.

Fig. 206. Swamp White Oak.

Having made comparisons between very dissimilar trees, compare those which are much alike, as the different kinds of maples, of elms, of oaks, of poplars. As your powers of observation become trained, compare the different varieties of the same kind of fruit trees, if there are good orchards in the vicinity. The different varieties of pears afford excellent contrasts. Contrast the Bartlett with the Flemish Beauty, the Kieffer with the Seckel. In apples, compare the Baldwin with the Spy, the King with the Twenty Ounce. The sweet and sour cherries show marked differences in method of branching. Fruit men can tell many varieties apart in winter. How?

Two common hickories are shown in [Figs. 203] and [204]. How do they differ? Do they differ in length of trunk? General method of branching? Direction of branches? Character of twig growth? Straightness or crookedness of branches?

Contrast the slippery elm ([Fig. 205]) and the common or American elm ([Fig. 211]). The former has a crotchy or forked growth, and long, stiff, wide-spreading branches. The latter is more vase-like in shape. The branches are willowy and graceful, with a tendency to weep.

Compare the oaks. The white and scarlet oaks have short trunks when they grow in fields, and the main branches are comparatively few and make bold angles and curves. The swamp white oak ([Fig. 206]), however, has a more continuous trunk, with many comparatively small, horizontal, and tortuous branches.

With [Fig. 206] compare the pepperidge ([Fig. 207]). This is one of the most unusual and interesting of all our native trees. It grows in swales. It has a very tough-grained wood. The autumn foliage is deep red and handsome. The peculiarities of the tree are the continuation of the trunk to near the summit, and the many lateral, short, deflected, tortuous branches.