Norwich bulletin., 1921-01-29
DIFFICULTIES IN PICKING A NATIONAL TREE

height of ITO to 230 feet. with circum- ference of 50 feet and cones from 12 to IS inches long. This pinus is found 1 abundantly two degrees south of the Co., lumbia river, in the country of the Umpuha tribe of Indians, who collect It's seeds in autumn and grind them into a kind of cake.
 This letter was written on March 24, 1926. But Douglas was not unmindful of the grandeur of the tree that now bears his name. In the elaborate appen- dix to his journal he records that it is "one of the most striking and truly graceful objects in nature" and that particularly Is this true of those inter spersed in groups or standing solitary,
 while in forest conditions they "arrive at magniture exceeded by few if any trees in the world" He records a stump be- hind old Fort George which measured | three feet from tho ground. The tree,
 he adds. had been burned Ito give place
 to 8 more useful vegetable. namely. po-
 tatoes." Though the botanist probably did not foresee the immense utility that | this variety would attain, he did not un- lderrate its importance in other respects, and expressed hope that it would prove
 a beautiful acquisition to English cylva, eff not an important addition to our
 
 from the latitude of Cape Blanco to the lStraits of Juan de Fuca, range of some isix degrees. and found 8 few stragglers as far south as Cape Mendocino. Doug Has largest recorded fir was 227 feet tall, with circumference of 1-2 feet 159
 feet from the ground.
 Lewis and Clark in their journal re-
 cord that they found, trees (probably of
 this speoies) that measured forty-two
 feet in circumference at a point beyond
 the reach of an ordinary man." and cal
 conference at point beyond the reach
 of an ordinary man." and calculated their
 height at 300 feet Thirty years after
 Douglas, Lieutenant Henry L. aAbbott, of
 the corps of typographical engineers en-
 gagged in exploration for route for a
 railroad from the Sacramento to the
 Columbia, paid higher tribute of ap-
 preciation. "rhe &ize of Abies Douglasii,' ' he wrote, 'has not been overstated. I; is indeed the grandest of the group of giants that combine to form the forests of the far west" He called 1t Douglas
 spruce and declared that 1t was "com. mon south to the Mexican boundary" a statement with which other explorers would not agree. and made official rec : ord of this description of it's occurrence The trees stand relatively as near each other and the trees are as long and slen. der as the canes in a canebrake. The amount of timber on an acre very much 3 exceeds that of similar area in th' i. tropics, or in any part of the world t have visited. Were 1t not that vegetabl, tissue will burn readily. the immenst . mass of it which encuulbers the surfac, g of an ordinary farm on the banks O e the Columbia would bid defiance to an, e efforts that one man could make for 1t removal during the term of his natura r life.
 d The tallest Douglas fir of record ex T ceeds considerably the measurements 0 e Douglas himself. Records of the Ameri l. can Forestry Association contain an al g fusion to one specimen with a height 0
 3So feet, and to single trees which scale r. 60,000 feet. board measure Visitors t > the forestry building during the Lewi l. and Clark exposition in, Portland were a
 deeply impressed with the specimens C ,f western fir as was Douglas himself wit S. the Pinus LaTnbertiana which was to hi- ,f- the outstanding memory of his America IS xpedition.-Portland Oregonian.