Sequoia, widely scattered with several species over the northern hemisphere during the cretaceous and tertiary epochs, is now confined to the coast of Oregon and California and the mountains of California, where two species exist.
The name of the genus is formed from Sequoiah, the inventor of the Cherokee alphabet.
CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES.
Leaves mostly spreading in 2 ranks; cones maturing in one season; buds scaly. 1. S. sempervirens (G). Leaves slightly spreading or appressed; cones maturing in their second season; buds naked. 2. S. gigantea (G).
Leaves of secondary branches and of lower branches of young trees lanceolate, more or less falcate, acute or acuminate and usually tipped with slender rigid points, slightly thickened on the revolute margins, decurrent at the base, spreading in 2 ranks by a half-turn at their base, ¼′—½′ long, about ⅛′ wide, obscurely keeled and marked above by 2 narrow bands of stomata, glaucous and stomatiferous below on each side of their conspicuous midrib, on leading shoots disposed in many ranks, more or less spreading or appressed, ovate or ovate-oblong, incurved at the rounded apiculate apex, thickened, rounded, and stomatiferous on the lower surface, concave, prominently keeled and covered with stomata on the upper surface, usually about ¼′ long; dying and turning reddish brown at least two years before falling. Flowers opening in December or January; male oblong, obtuse; female with about 20 broadly ovate acute scales tipped with elongated and incurved or short points. Fruit ripening in October, oblong, ¾′—1′ long, ½′ broad, its scales gradually enlarged from slender stipes abruptly dilated above into disks penetrated by deep narrow grooves, and usually without tips; seeds about 1/16′ long, light brown, with wings as broad as their body.
A tree, from 200°—340° high, with a slightly tapering and irregularly lobed trunk usually free of branches for 75°—100°, usually 10°—15°, rarely 28° in diameter at the much buttressed base, slender branches, clothed with branchlets spreading in 2 ranks and forming while the tree is young an open narrow pyramid, on old trees becoming stout and horizontal, and forming a narrow rather compact and very irregular head remarkably small in proportion to the height and size of the trunk, and slender leading branchlets covered at the end of three or four years after the leaves fall with cinnamon-brown scaly bark; when cut producing from the stump numerous vigorous long-lived shoots. Buds with numerous loosely imbricated ovate acute scales persistent on the base of the branchlet. Bark 6′—12′ thick, divided into rounded ridges and separated on the surface into long narrow dark brown fibrous scales often broken transversely and in falling disclosing the bright cinnamon-red inner bark. Wood light, soft, not strong, close-grained, easily split and worked, very durable in contact with the soil, clear light red; largely manufactured into lumber and used for shingles, fence-posts, railway-ties, wine-butts, and in buildings.