The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1903-12-30
Wherein the Trees Are Like You.

DO you know that trees breathe
very much as you do? The lungs OF
the tree are more beautiful to look ut
than human lungs. They are bright
iy colored and beautiful in Shape.
They ere outside Of the trees body
instead Of being hidden as your lungs
are.
i Gae ttTse D lungs are the leaves.
| These leaf-luugs breathe ateadily
and constantly. Like yours, they
take in oxygen from che air, and it is
converted into the liee-sustain;ug sap
whioa 10 che blood Of the tree and
which cirouletes through the trees
body just as does your blood.
Unlike your lungs, however, the
trees lungs need sunlight on them in
order to work. Therefore, while tho
leaves breathe in oxygen oil day anu
all night, they do not exhala the
waste matter in the night very freely.
Consequently there is more carbonic
acid in the tree tnan it can breathe
ent.
In your body this carbonic acid
gas would poison your system and
kill you. In the tree it burns up and
forms carbon that makes the wood
and other material for the growth of
the tree.
II you will look at the young
branches OF birches, cherry trees and
poplars, you will see queer little OBJ
long and oval spots that are raised
bit above the surrounding bark. These
are ell like pores Of the human skin,
and they, too, take in Oxygen.
Often, especially in the spring, you
will notice that trees will be dripping
vet even 6hough there has been no re.
cent rain. Orohardists will tell you
then that che trees are sweating. That
is exactly true, and this is how and
why they do it.
The leaves Of stree do not merely
breathe oxygen in aad carbonio and
gas out. They also breathe out We
Sery vapor. This 10 because Che roots
OF tree take up great deal more
water than can be used readily in the
tree. This water is sucked up into
the twigs and leaves.
When they are gorged the cap,
which is the product Of the digestion
of che earthly food and water taken
/ up by the roots, cannot enter these
water.gorged parts, and the water
must be forced out of the leaves and
the pores.
Sometimes the trees have so much
water pumped up through them that
they cannot get rid Of it all in the
form Of vapor, and it actually drips in
drops from the buds and leaves.
In most trees tho water is pumped
up through the newest aayera af the
wood. The result is that the wood
that is formed during the seasons
when the tree needs great DEAL Of
water is always thinner aaa lighter
than the wood that is formed when
the tree does not make such great de-
mands.
| This will explain how lumbermen
can tell, By looking at.s felled tree,
which parts Of It's trunk were formed
in spring and which in summer. The
wood formed in the summer, when
the tree needs less food, is always
heavier and stronger ard often gen.
orally darker in color than is the
spring wood, when all the trees pumps
were busily at work.
A tree grows in height only. by
means Of new, w,twigs and added wood.
If you were TO drive ns:l into a
young tree. say four feet from the
ground this autumn it would still be
only four Feet from tho ground in ten
years from now or in two hundred
years. It would be hidden by new
wood that had formed around it, and
the tree might be ten times bigger
around than it was when you drove
the nail. But it would not have NOV
ed a'single inch in height. The tree
has grown 10 height in all thas time
only by adding new tops. S,S.
Hollow trees often live and, -four
ish and bear fruit. How can they do
| it2 .s
When q tree first fora, . layer Of
wood. that layer is porous and full.of
cells. Through these the sap runa
freely as through human veins and
arteries. The wood Is known then as
sap wood.
As new layers form year BY year
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