476 BOTANICAL SURVEY OF DISMAL SWAMP REGION. 



and dune areas, at least without great expense; but by careful drain- 

 age a great part of the wooded swamps can be converted into highly 

 valuable land. In this process, however, the soil loses the chemical 

 and physical peculiarities just enumerated, and if afterwards per- 

 mitted to lie fallow it becomes rapidly overgrown with the ordinary 

 not swampy forest vegetation of the region. Unless it reverts to its 

 original condition as to drainage, such land has ceased forever to 

 belong to the swampy forest formation. 



TYPES OF ARABLE SOILS. 



Tw<» leading types of soil are easily distinguishable in that part of 

 the Dismal Swamp region which is occupied by neither salt marshes, 

 saiul strand, nor wooded swamps. 



1. Soils of a light, sandy text ure, warm, and capable, when cleared, 

 of thorough drainage. These are the " 4 truck soils," which are largely 

 devoted to the growing of garden vegetables, the chief industry of the 

 region. They usually occur on or very near tide water. 



2. Soils with a relatively high content of silt or clay, and conse- 

 quently colder and more retentive of water. These are mostly inland 

 soils, and as has already been pointed out, are ill adapted to many 

 truck crops, but give good returns, under proper management, with 

 grasses and some cereals. 



The truck lands are at present by far the most valuable of the 

 region, and with them we shall therefore chiefly concern ourselves. 

 What is the character of the original forest and undergrowth on soils 

 of this class? Is it sufficiently well marked to enable us to say with 

 confidence, after an examination of the native vegetation alone, 

 "Here we have or have not a good truck soil 





NATIVE VEGETATION OF TRUCK LANDS. 



Before answering this question it may be well to describe briefly 

 the more important growth upon a number of representative tracts of 

 forest where the question could be satisfactorily answered in the 

 affirmative after an inspection of the soil itself and of the appearance 

 of crops in adjacent fields. 



1. On one of the largest and best truck farms along the Western 

 branch of Elizabeth River, near Norfolk, the following growth was 

 noted: Short-leaf pine (Pimistaeda), 40 to 50 feet high, intermixed with 

 much hardwood— water oak (Quercus nigra), willow oak (Quercus 

 ]>}h>IIos), white oak (Querctus alba), sweet gum (Liquidambar siyraci- 

 ftua), and sour gum {Nyssa sylvatica). Undergrowth dense, com- 

 posed of red maple (Acer mbrum), sourwood (Oxydendrum arbo- 

 reum), huckleberry ((rayluxsacia frondosu), pepper bush (Clethra 

 cdnifolia), sassafras, sumac (Rhus copaUina), spikenard tree (Aralia 

 spinosa), small cane (Arundinaria tecfa), etc. The presence of sev- 

 eral of these plants, especially of the water oak, red maple, and 



