3. Var. aurea, Beissner,! young foliage golden yellow, gradually changing to a silvery grey colour.
4. Var. bvevtfolia, Beissner,' leaves short, thick, obtuse, twice as broad as in the typical form.
Distribution
Abies concolor occurs in the Rocky Mountains of southern Colorado and extends southwards over the mountains of New Mexico and Arizona into northern Mexico, being the only silver fir in the arid regions of the Great Basin and of southern New Mexico and Arizona. It occurs also in Utah in the Wasatch Mountains, and in southern California, in the San Bernardino and San Jacinto Mountains. It is accordingly confined to dry regions, while Adzes Lowzana, which is in all probability only a geographical form of it, occurs in the more rainy regions of the Sierra Nevada of California and the southern mountains of Oregon. According to some opinions, the three species, Abies grandis, Abies Lowiana, and Abies concolor are only geographical forms of one large species.
Sargent says, of Abies concolor, that it endures heat and dryness best of all the silver firs of North America, and its distribution is accordingly more southerly than that of the other species, which occur in the United States.
History and Cultivation
This species was discovered by Fendler, near Sante Fé, in 1847, and was first clearly described by Parlatore, who adopted for it Engelmann’s MS. name, Pinus concolor. It does not appear to have been introduced? into cultivation until about 1872. Syme mentions® two-year-old seedlings of it as a new species in 1875. Roezl, apparently in 1874, sent specimens and seeds, which were labelled Picea concolor violacea,* from New Mexico to Messrs. Sanders and Co., St. Albans. This species has been much confused with A. Lowiana, which was introduced considerably earlier. It is probable that there are no trees of true A. concolor in cultivation, older than 1873 or 1874.
Abies concolor, according to Sargent, is the only American silver fir, which is really successful in cultivation in the eastern part of the United States, where it grows better than A. Lowiana.
We have seen few trees of large size, though one at Highnam Court, Gloucester- shire, of no great age, was 44 feet by 2 feet 9 inches in 1908.
It is less common in cultivation than A. Lowiana, which it much excels in beauty of foliage. Mr. Crozier says that young trees growing at Durris are quite healthy. (A.H.)
1 Mitt. Deut. Dendr. Ges. 1906, p. 144.
2 Roezl sent a few seeds in 1872. Cf. Lavallée, Nouveaux Conifères du Colorado et de la Californie, in Journ, Soc. Cent. Hort. France, viii. (1875).
3 Gard. Chron, iii. 563 (1875).
4 Ibid. 464.
