THE BUCKEYES The Ohio buckeye is a little tree, but it has given its name to the Buckeye State. There must have been many of them in the virgin forest that the Ohio pioneer cut down to make room for his crops of corn and grain. He noticed these trees particularly because of a disagreeable odour that comes from the bitter sap. The chopping and handling of these trees intensifies this odour, which is noticeable even when one drives past a growing tree.
The name was given by some imaginative per son who saw a resemblance between the smooth brown nuts and the soft brown eyes of a buck. The white of the eye corresponds to the dash of white on the nut. Deer abounded in the virgin forests, and no doubt it was one of the first settlers, a hunter as well as a farmer, who named the tree.
The flowers and leaves resemble those of the horse-chestnut, but are smaller, as the tree is. The number of leaflets is five, rarely seven, and they cluster on the end of a long leaf stem. The flowers appear in April and May, and are not conspicuous, for they are yellowish-green, and make little contrast with the new leaves.
One thing is to be said in favour of this smelling tree. Its wood has been found to be the best kind for the making of artificial limbs. To this special use the lumber is chiefly devoted. The sweet buckeye lacks the disagreeable odour of the Ohio buckeye, and its nuts are eaten by cattle. It is a handsome, large tree, with leaves
of five slim leaflets, more or less hairy below, and on the veins above. The flowers are yellow and showy. Each corolla is drawn out into a tube, like a honeysuckle's. The husks of the nuts are smooth. This species grows from West ern Pennsylvania along the mountain slopes to Alabama, and on the prairies westward to Iowa. The nuts are full of starch, and these are ground into flour, which is used by bookbinders in mak ing their paste. The reason why this paste is preferred is that destructive insects do not eat it as they do paste made of wheat flour.
A red-flowered buckeye tree of small size s wild from Missouri to Texas, and east into Ten nessee to Northern Alabama. This is not the same as the red horse-chestnut, which is some times seen in cultivation as a handsome tree, twenty to thirty feet high.
In the far West, the California buckeye is a wide-topped tree of good size, with leaves of the true horse-chestnut type, and white or rose coloured flowers, in showy clusters, and smooth, pear-shaped nuts. This is the only one of our native species which grows beyond the Rocky Mountains.