In Descending The Eastern Slopes Of The Cascades The Rich, Abounding,
Triumphant Exuberance Of The Trees Is Quickly Subdued; They
Become
smaller, grow wide apart, leaving dry spaces without moss covering or
underbrush, and before the foot of the range
Is reached, fail
altogether, stayed by the drouth of the interior almost as suddenly as
on the western margin they are stayed by the sea. Here and there at
wide intervals on the eastern plains patches of a small pine (Pinus
contorta) are found, and a scattering growth of juniper, used by the
settlers mostly for fence posts and firewood. Along the stream
bottoms there is usually more or less of cottonwood and willow, which,
though yielding inferior timber, is yet highly prized in this bare
region. On the Blue Mountains there is pine, spruce, fir, and larch
in abundance for every use, but beyond this range there is nothing
that may be called a forest in the Columbia River basin, until we
reach the spurs of the Rocky Mountains; and these Rocky Mountain
forests are made up of trees which, compared with the giants of the
Pacific Slope, are mere saplings.
XXII
The Forests of Oregon and their Inhabitants
Like the forests of Washington, already described, those of Oregon are
in great part made up of the Douglas spruce[32], or Oregon pine (Abies
Douglasii). A large number of mills are at work upon this species,
especially along the Columbia, but these as yet have made but little
impression upon its dense masses, the mills here being small as
compared with those of the Puget Sound region. The white cedar, or
Port Orford cedar (Cupressus Lawsoniana, or Chamaecyparis Lawsoniana),
is one of the most beautiful of the evergreens, and produces excellent
lumber, considerable quantities of which are shipped to the San
Francisco market. It is found mostly about Coos Bay, along the
Coquille River, and on the northern slopes of the Siskiyou Mountains,
and extends down the coast into California. The silver firs, the
spruces, and the colossal arbor-vitae, or white cedar[33](Thuja
gigantea), described in the chapter on Washington, are also found here
in great beauty and perfection, the largest of these (Picea grandis,
Loud.; Abies grandis, Lindl.) being confined mostly to the coast
region, where it attains a height of three hundred feet, and a
diameter of ten or twelve feet. Five or six species of pines are
found in the State, the most important of which, both as to lumber and
as to the part they play in the general wealth and beauty of the
forests, are the yellow and sugar pines (Pinus ponderosa and P.
Lambertiana). The yellow pine is most abundant on the eastern slopes
of the Cascades, forming there the main bulk of the forest in many
places. It is also common along the borders of the open spaces in
Willamette Valley. In the southern portion of the State the sugar
pine, which is the king of all the pines and the glory of the Sierra
forests, occurs in considerable abundance in the basins of the Umpqua
and Rogue Rivers, and it was in the Umpqua Hills that this noble tree
was first discovered by the enthusiastic botanical explorer David
Douglas, in the year 1826.
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