White cedar

“ Fence posts of white cedar, and cedar pails, shingles, and the like, have a great reputation for durability.
The peculiarity of a red cedar is its fruit. Instead of a cone, a blue, juicy, sweet berry follows the blossoming of this tree. The foliage, too, is erratic. Minute leaves of the scale form, discovered in the other cedars, are found here on most twigs. They are still smaller, and the twigs are much smaller. But on new shoots, and often on a whole branch, the leaves are needle-like, one-half to three-quarters of an inch long, and spreading as the leaves of a spruce. ”

“ Like the Eastern cedar, however, this white cedar is very durable. I remember seeing in the woods once a fallen log, on which was growing a Douglas fir two and a half feet in diameter. The seed of the fir had fallen on the log and sprouted, and, as the fir grew, it sent down its roots to the ground on either side of the cedar log, so that at last it straddled it. The fir was about two and a half feet in diameter, and so it had been growing there a great many years, but the fallen cedar log was to all appearance as sound as if it had not been lying there a year. ”

“ The northern white cedar varies greatly in size and shape, depending on the soil, climate, and situation. Though it is usually associated with swamps in the North, it adapts itself to quite different situations. It grows in narrow, rocky ravines, on stony ridges, and it clings to the faces of cliffs, or hangs on their summits as tenaciously as the western juniper of the Sierra Nevada mountains. ”

“ The mighty cedar, with its long, grand sweeps of feathery needles, towers up higher even than its comrade the fir; here and there beneath the trees is scattered about an undergrowth of young pines, almost branchless, like bristles or long sticks standing up out of the earth. But [143] the commonest trees in this forest are certainly silver birches. The trunks of these birches stand out sometimes straight and slender, with delicate heads of foliage, looking like cadets in their white shirts; sometimes gnarled, branchy, knotted, with the air of a burly peasant, rugged with labour. ”

“ The trail here was so wide that Joe could trot ahead and ask Mills.
“Yes, they are cedars,” Mills said. “They call ’em white cedars, I believe. The wood is much softer than your slow-growing cedar in the East. It’s a great forest, isn’t it?” ”

“ The property of this cedar which appealed to the Indians is disliked by the sawmill man. It is hard to make thin lumber that will hang together. The tendency to part along the growth rings develops wind-shake while the tree is standing. About nine trees in ten are so defective from shake that little good lumber can be made from them. It is a common saying, which probably applies in certain localities only, that a thousand feet of white cedar must be sawed to get one hundred feet of good lumber. ”

“ Good young cedar in forests which are to be handled under the selection system should be carefully protected. It can always be utilized and may bring revenue before anything else can be cut. For the same reason it has been suggested for planting with fir and white pine, either simultaneously as a small proportion or later in blank spaces where the others fail. Under such conditions the main stand will not be modified and the cedar will afford a valuable adjunct. ”

“ They are most vigorous on cold, wet areas known as cedar swamps. [96] The giant arborvitæ (T. gigantea) , noted for its great girth, and the yellow and Lawson Cypresses, are important Pacific coast species. The incense cedar, while much subject to fungus trouble, is also prized. [97] White cedar wood is durable, plentiful, and employed in exposed positions as ties and shingles.
Arborvitæs (Thuya) have very small overlapping leaves that form flat rods or fan-like sprays. The cones are oblong, less than one-half inch in length, and all of their six or eight scales separate or open when ripe. ”

“ Here and there a straight pine or cedar, more lofty than its fellows, caught with its feathery top a glinting sun-ray and held it, whilst high up, almost overhead, upon a rocky spur emerging from the foliage there stood a humble hermitage, and on the very summit, looking so inaccessible that no human foot could reach it, a little white tower of another hermitage reared its cross over all. ”

“ Its heart is almost as red as blood, and the wood has a sweet fragrance; the sap is nearly white, the grain soft and weak, but it will last for hundreds of years. I have seen beams of cedar that were laid before the Revolution and they were as sound as when hewn. Cedar wood makes a good bow ”

“ To the northward, over Maine and Ottawa, rose hosts of spiry, rosiny evergreens,—white pine and spruce, hemlock and cedar, shoulder to shoulder, laden with purple cones, their myriad needles sparkling and shimmering, covering hills and swamps, rocky headlands and domes, ever bravely aspiring and seeking the sky; the ground in their shade now snow-clad and frozen, now mossy and flowery; beaver meadows here and there, full of lilies and grass; lakes gleaming like eyes, and a silvery embroidery of rivers and creeks watering and brightening all the vast glad wilderness. ”

“ The seeds are angular, with a wedge-shaped wing.
The trees do not produce cones until they are from twenty-five to thirty years old; but they may be a century old before producing either male or female flowers.
The trunk is covered with thick, rough, deeply fissured bark. On the branches the bark is smooth, and peels off in thin flakes. The Cedar, in its native habitat, produces admirable timber, but that of trees grown in our own country is described by Loudon as "reddish-white, light and spongy, easily worked, but very apt to shrink and warp, and by no means durable." ”

“ But first a special word for the tree itself: everybody knows that the cedar is a healthy, cheap, democratic wood, streak'd red and white—an evergreen—that it is not a cultivated tree—that it keeps away moths—that it grows inland or seaboard, all climates, hot or cold, any soil—in fact rather prefers sand and bleak side spots—content if the plough, the fertilizer and the trimming-axe, will but keep away and let it alone. ”

“ What serene skies—what brilliant sunshine—what tropical wealth of verdure! At every pore the rich earth burst forth into fruit and flower. Two months after the grass had been sunk deep beneath the snow, sheets of strawberries were spread in the woods, an extemporized feast.
One might think that the cottage at Cedar Creek had also bloomed under the fair weather; for when July—hottest of Canadian months—came, the dingy wooden walls had assumed a dazzling white, with a roof so grey that the shingles might have been veritable slates. Resemblance to the lime-washed houses of home was Robert's fancy ”

“ We found, however, on reaching the plain, that they were the cedars we sought. They stand in irregular groups, spread over several little stony knolls, and may possibly cover eight or ten acres of ground. They are not what with us is called the cedar, but a variety of the pine. It is a resinous tree bearing a cone. The wood is of a white pine-like appearance. We spread our carpets, and spent the night under one of the father-trees of this grove.
It is not easy to decide how many old trees there are; eight or ten have a more venerable appearance than the remainder ”

“ They will well repay all the watching one gives them. The cedar waxwing is a strange bird, with a very pronounced species-individuality, totally unlike any other bird of our country. When feeding on their favourite winter berries, these birds show to great advantage; the warm rich brown of the upper parts and of the crest contrasting with the black, scarlet, and yellow, and these, in turn, with the dark green of the cedar and the white of the snow. ”

“ The Americans ornament their chimney-glasses with garlands of this plant, mixed with the dried blossoms of the life-everlasting (the pretty white and yellow flowers we call love-everlasting) : this plant is also called festoon-pine. In my rambles in the wood near the house I have discovered a trailing plant bearing a near resemblance to the cedar, which I consider has, with equal propriety, a claim to the name of ground or creeping cedar. ”

“ It will shade out the European grasses that still grow knee deep and fill their places with dainty cedar - 242 - moss and the shy wild flowers of the deep wood. Yet for all that the trail of the pioneers, the boundaries that they set and the work of their hands will never be quite disestablished on the spot. ”

“ White men have put western red cedar to many uses, as shingles, lumber, cooperage, poles, posts, piles, car siding and roofing, boat building from skiffs to ships, and general furniture and interior finish. ”

“ Here, too, is to be found the variety of white or yellow cedar (Libo cedrus decurrens) , growing to a size not seen at a less altitude, unless perhaps on the north side of some spur from these mountains. If the ridge be followed to the right as far as the Big Trees, instead of descending the road to the South Fork, some very large pine, cedar and fir trees will be seen, in addition to the great attraction, the Sequoia. ”

“ A fairly tall perennial growing to be from 2 to 3 feet high and found only in moist places at high elevations of the plateaus. It is common at and near Cedar Breaks along the streams or in the swampy meadows. The small clusters of drooping, delicate-blue flowers come mostly in May and June or even later at the higher elevations of Brian Head Peak near Cedar Breaks. Before maturing the flowers may be pinkish to white in color. ”

“ Douglas and silver firs, western hemlock and red cedar grow to remarkable size and height. The towering trees, heavy with hanging moss, and the lush undergrowth give the impression of a tropical forest. In the summer the valleys are very beautiful, with sunlight and shadow falling in fascinating patterns through the green, moss-draped trees. In the Canadian zone, where elevations range from 1,500 to 3,500 feet, the silver fir is noticeable, with a sprinkling of western white pine, Douglas fir, and western cedar. ”

“ Rocks the size of a city block lie here roughly placed one upon another with caverns of unknown depth made by the openings between them. Out of these caverns wells up on the hottest days a cold that undoubtedly comes from ice that forms in depths to which no man's eye has penetrated, and that remains the year through. The clinging of gray lichens upon these rocks has made roothold for the dainty cedar moss which makes them green and holds moisture in turn for the roots of firs that grow from the very rocks and fill their gaps with - 258 - forest. ”

“ This red-berried Elder is found the most abundantly at Cedar Breaks. It is also common along the highways through forested areas of the region.
The clusters of small white flowers that come on usually in June or July give way to bright-red berries in August and present a most attractive display.
Most Elders are edible and are eaten by birds and rodents. Some people gather the berries for wines and jellies. This species, however, is considered poisonous, and cases of poisoning have been reported from eating the berries, flowers, roots and bark. ”

“ It literally never rots. The most striking characteristic of the cedars is their almost incredible vitality. The oldest of all are gnarled and twisted, but they have the rough strength of muscle-bound giants. Each year new [172] cones rise above the broad, green branches, and the balsamic juice flows fresh from every break in the bark. In the words of the Psalmist, they still bring forth fruit in old age, and are full of sap and green. “There is not, and never has been, a rotten cedar. The wood is incorruptible. ”

“ In this area they are found abundantly on the high plateaus, being especially plentiful at Cedar Breaks, where they fill whole meadows with a mass of blue color in midsummer.
The Lupines range in color from pale pink to deep purple, with some white, cream or yellow, but most of them are blue. Like other plants of the Pea Family, Lupines add nitrogen to the soil and thereby improve the land on which they grow. The seeds of a few species contain alkaloids which are poisonous to livestock, especially sheep.
Lupine
29 43. ”

“ The sturdy storm-enduring red cedar (Juniperus occidentalis) delights to dwell on the tops of granite domes and ridges and glacier pavements of the upper pine belt, at an elevation of seven to ten thousand feet, where it can get plenty of sunshine and snow and elbow-room without encountering quick-growing overshadowing rivals. ”

“ She had gone forth from Jamestown "lonely as a cloud," and not without sorrow. The wild flower that grows by the bleakest roadside wilts and droops for a time, at least, when transplanted to even the most sheltered garden. The stunted cedar, clinging to a crevice in the granite, drawing its meagre juices hardly from the niggard soil, yellows and dies when rent by the resistless wind from its rocky resting-place. The barrenness of the mountain-side seems kinder to it than the green meadows to which it is hurled. ”

“ The nature of this tree is not to elevate its trunk, or the part between the root and the first branches; for the largest Cedars which we saw did not in the height of their trunks exceed six or seven feet. From this low but enormously thick body, prodigious branches rise, spreading as they rise, and forming by the disposition of their boughs and leaves which point upward, a sort of wheel which appears to be the work of art. The bark of the cedar, except at the trunk, is smooth and shining, of a brown colour. ”