The Balsam Fir - Abies Balsamea Mill

THE BALSAM FIR - ABIES BALSAMEA MILL.

The balsam fir is probably best known as the typical Christmas tree of the Northeastern states and the source of Canada balsam, used in laboratories and in medicine. Fresh leaves stuff the balsam pillows of summer visitors to the North Woods. In the lumber trade and in horti culture this fir tree cuts a sorry figure, for its wood is weak, coarse, and not durable, and in cultivation it is short lived, and early loses its lower limbs.

Throughout New England, northward to Labrador, and southward along the mountains to southwestern Vir ginia, this tree may be known at a glance by its two ranked, pale-lined leaves, lustrous and dark green above, one half to one and one half inches long, sometimes notched on twigs near the top of the tree. Rich dark

purple cones, two to four inches long, with thin plain margined, broad scales, stand erect, glistening with drops of balsam, on branches near the top of the tree. The same balsam exudes from bruises in the smooth bark. By piercing the white blisters and systematically wound ing branch and trunk, the limpid balsam is made to flow freely, and is collected as a commercial enterprise in some parts of Canada. "Oil of fir" also is obtained from the bark.