Arizona republican., 1919-10-27

hand, has outlived the great empires of human history, enjoying vigorous growth for three or four thousand years. No fungus or insect pest is able to harm it. Its top reaches $50 | lightning and resulting fires did not at last bring it down. it seems that it might live and grow forever And when, in the end, the giant trunk has crashed to earth among the smaller trees surrounding it, long depression | in the soil tells of the big trees cen | turies after forest fires have consumed the enormous mass of sound wood, to which fungus, insects and the tooth of time could do no harm. Some of the giants still growing in Mariposa park were already big trees, as New Eng land measures trees, when Abraham pastured his flocks in Palestine. Curious and many are the methods of traveiing adopted by plants. Most plants can, of course, travel only as seeds, although there are few excep- tions to this rule.
 l 'tThe advantage of the first conner. the squatter, one might say, plays an important part in the world of plant life. The cotton tufted seeds of will lows and poplars, and the little winged seeds of the white birch are carried by the wind in every direction, and they are produced in such abun- dance that every nook and patch of bare soil receives its supply. The re- suit is that these trees generally reach vcant land sooner than any of their competitors. The bare mud flat left by flood, the railroad gravel pit, the burned over and cut over pine forests are nearly always pre- -empted by will lows, poplars or birches because their seeds are much more widely dissemi- mated than the seeds of any other northern trees. Poplars and birches, however, are short lived trees, and within century the dominant pines will supplant them.
 Shrubs and trees, as well as vines and herbs. that depend on birds for the dissemination of their seeds run the wind planted species a close race. Woodbine and wild grapes, dogwood and hackberry, wild cherries and plums, strawberries and raspberries spring up as if by magic as soon as the lumberman, fire or storm have cleared
 the ground for them.
 "Of many plants it is not very diff
 ficult to discover their methods of
 travelling.
 
 delion sail like parachutes away from
 the parent plant. The gold-dotted hedges of jewel weed, or touch me- not,
 which mirror their delicate flowers and foliage in the dark, silent water of northern beaver ponds are planted by | the beavers themselves as they travel and work on their dams; while birds
 in their daily and seasonal flights e plant those remarkable gardens of t many kinds of wild fruit, whose pres n ence on widely separated islands and
 mountains and in the depths of isolated
 canyons delights both the eye and the = palate of the explorer.
 ' There are, however, numerous in . stances of plant distribution which present most interesting puzzles to T naturalists and foresters.
 . "One of the most puzZling cases of o plant migration or distribution is that e of the devils club. This plant is a ' common shrub in the moist forests Of y the Pacific coast and in certain locali m ties in the Rocky mountains, where, 'e on account of it's countless sharp spines q it is the terror of the woodsmen and n. timber cruisers. It is not forests re touching the Great Lakes, except in 1t several spots on Isle Royale in Lake le Superior How it traversed the in in tervening thousand miles of plan and Id forest and established itself on an st island in Lake Superior is hard to le imagine.
 ia "One possible solution must not be in overlooked in such cases as that of the T. deveils club. They may be cases of s
 remnant vegetation, just as scattered ;s groves of giant sequoias are undoubt- v edly only the remnants of former large Il, sequoia forests.
 "The tree, although one of our raresl = forest trees, is found from Pennsyivay mia to the Indian Territory, but i H.. grows in small colonies, often mile. y apart. It is found on rich bottom land. ], and on islands in large lakes. It ma. n be tha grouse occasionally swallow th' ee seeds as they swallow pebbles. for i ne seems impossible that the seeds couli er reach islands without the aid of som ne birds. It is likely that the passenge ed pigeons in days gone by distribute the seeds of the coffee tree. as "A small cactus the jointed opuntia US is widely distributed in arid region
 from New Mexico northward In som a. mysterious way it has reached dr
 rocky lodges in humid Minnesota an O. Wisconsin. A few years ago while O m a canoe trip on Lake of the Woods he scientist found fresh joint of thi a cactus among the boulders of the On elk tario shore in a .dspselgs@X Qodsd re
 zion. How the pt&n r TT Ehi Ter spot has remained a Sec14 1