his species are highly valued for making fancy articles, gavels, etc.
It is extensively used for turnery, buttons, spools, bobbins, wheel
hubs, etc. Maine to Minnesota and southward to Tennessee.

=16. Red Birch= (_Betula rubra_ var. _nigra_) (River Birch). Small to
medium-sized tree, very common. Lighter and less valuable than the
preceding. Heartwood light brown, sapwood pale. Wood light, fairly
strong and close-grained. Red birch is best developed in the middle
South, and usually grows near the banks of rivers. Its bark hangs in
tatters, even worse than that of paper birch, but it is darker. In
Tennessee the slack coopers have found that red birch makes excellent
barrel heads and it is sometimes employed in preference to other
woods. In eastern Maryland the manufacturers of peach baskets draw
their supplies from this wood, and substitute it for white elm in
making the hoops or bands which stiffen the top of the basket, and
provide a fastening for the veneer which forms the sides. Red birch
bends in a very satisfactory manner, which is an important point. This
wood enters pretty generally into the manufacture of woodenware within
its range, but statistics do not mention it by name. It is also used
in the manufacture of veneer picnic plates, pie plates, butter dishes,
washboards, small handles, kitchen and pantry utensils, and ironing
boards. New England to Texas and Missouri.

=17. Canoe Birch= (_Betula paprifera_) (White Birch, Paper Birch). Small
to medium-sized tree, sometimes forming forests, very common.
Heartwood light brown tinged with red, sapwood lighter color. Wood of
good quality, but light, fairly hard and strong, tough, close-grained.
Sap flows freely in spring and by boiling can be made into syrup. Not
as valuable as any of the preceding. Canoe birch is a northern tree,
easily identified by its white trunk and its ragged bark. Large
numbers of small wooden boxes are made by boring out blocks of this
wood, shaping them in lathes, and fitting lids on them. Canoe birch is
one of the best woods for this class of commodities, because it can be
worked very thin, does not split readily, and is of pleasing color.
Such boxes, or two-piece diminutive kegs, are used as containers for
articles shipped and sold in small bulk, such as tacks, small nails,
and brads. Such containers are generally cylindrical and of
considerably greater depth than diameter. Many others of nearly
similar form are made to contain ink bott