Waterbury evening Democrat., 1908-08-04

certain oak often called both black and yellow oak used to be split into handmade lath in early days, and hence got also the name of Hath oak" But since to make good lath straight grained tree was needed, some woodsmen think that black oak, such as the lathmaker would have selected by its looks, is a different kind of tree from other black oaks. Black oak is also used as subgeneric term for all the many kinds of oak which, unlike the white oaks, have leaves with bristle tipped lobes and take two years to mature their acorns. h. deed the local names given to the 47 different oaks found in the
 United States are almost without limit. What is called black locust in Pennsylvania is yellow locust in Massachusetts, white locust in New York, red locust in one part of Tennessee and green in another. In Maine it is simply locust, in Louis- jana acacia, in Minnesota honey To- cuSt and in Maryland post locust. These many names overlap and are not strictly separated by state lines. On the other hand. the true honey locust (which belongs to an alto gether distinct genus from the black
 locust) is known also as black To- cust, sweet locust, thorn locust, To- cust, three thorned acacia, thorn tree, honey shucks, piquant amour
 cite, Confederate pin tree and a few other names. White pine Is a tree of so distinguished appearance that it is entitled to one name among lumbermen as well as among botanists. But 1t does not have it. In both Massachusetts and South Carolina it is sometimes known as. Weymouth pine, which is its univer- sal name in Europe. Pennsylvan- ians occasionally speak of it as soft pine, Tennesseeans as spruce, and in other parts of the south it is called northern pine. The loblolly pine is southern tree, and the people of the south have been liberal with names. In North Carolina 1t is
 loblolly, oldfield, torch, rosemary, slash, short leaf, sap, Indian, vel low, swamp and long straw, each being followed by the word pine. In Maryland 1t is long shucks, in Delaware long schat, in Virginia cornstalk, foxtail, spruce, swamp and others. It is called meadow pine in Florida. From New England to the Carolinas the tulip poplar is frequently called whitewood or tulip tree. Yellow poplar is it's usua- name in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Kentuckey and on the market in the form of lumber. It is tulip poplar in Illinois, poplar in Ohio, white poplar in Indiana, blue poplar in Delaware, hickory poplar in Vir- gina, popple in Rhode Island, cu- cumber tree in New York and canoe wood in Tennessee. The birches are equally rich in names, and some of the names cling after the lumber reaches market Scarcely half al dozen of the 500 species of forest trees found in the United States are popularly known by their botanical names. When mistakes are made in the Identification of wood finish ed for building purposes mucn em- barrassment and trouble often result Architects, builders and other users of lumber find that the situation is growing worse each year, because many of the kinds of lumber form, erly in heavy supply are now grow ing scarce, and substitutes are grad ually taking their places. To meet this demand of identification of trees by wood structure the government has established a laboratory which renders free service to all who send specimens for examination to the United States forest service at Washington.