| + | Morus rubra, Linn. Native Red Mulberry. Fig. 2401. Lvs. usually large, very various, those on the young shoots deeply lobed with very oblique and rounded sinuses in the base of which there are no teeth, the upper surface rough and the lower one soft or variously pubescent, the teeth medium or comparatively small and either rounded or bluntish: fr. deep red, or when fully ripe almost black, variable in size, often very good, nearly always having an agreeable slight acidity. Mass. to Fla., Kans. and Texas, mostly in rich soils and bottom lands. S.S. 7:320.—This native mulberry has been tried for the feeding of silkworms, but with indifferent success. At least 3 of the named fr.-bearing mulberries belong to it, and a yellow-lvd. mulberry, which is somewhat grown for ornament, also appears to be of this species. The characteristic lobing of lvs. on the young growth is shown in the upper spray of Fig. 2401. The nearest approach to this lobing is in the Japanese (Morus japonica), and this affords another of those interesting parallelisms which exist between the Japanese and E. American floras. The red mulberry is the largest tree of the genus. In the S. it often attains a height of 70 ft. and a diam. of 3 or 4 ft. The timber is used for posts and light woodwork. Var. tomentosa, Bureau (M. tomentosa, Raf.). Lvs. very soft- pubescent and whitish beneath, often glossy but rough above. Texas.—A large-fruited form of this was intro. in 1889 by T. V. Munson as the Lampasas mulberry |