VOL. I. | : Island Plants. | II 
expected to thrive in that part of the world; it would, therefore, be 
wise to watch carefully the results of this first experiment before 
making further importations, and also to take counsel of responsible 
naturalists before introducing other species, the desirability of which 
is not assured. 
THE PLANTS PECULIAR TO MAGDALENA AND SANTA 
MARGARITA ISLANDS. 
BY T. S. BRANDGEE. 
Magdalena Island, so called, is a low ridge joined by a very nar- 
row strip of sand to the mountain known as Cabo San Lazaro, from 
which a low line of sand between the lagoon and the ocean is con- 
tinued to the Boca de Soledad. No one has ever collected plants 
upon Cape St. Lazarus, but probably its flora would differ little from 
that of these islands. 
Santa Margarita Island is formed of two large mountains, sepa- 
rated by a lowland having little elevation above the sea. Magdalena 
is separated from the mainland by the width of the bay—a distance 
of about fourteen miles—but to the northward the sand strips reach 
within a mile of the sand of the mainland. Santa Margarita, sepa- 
rated from Magdalena only about nine miles, near its southern ex- 
tremity also approaches close to the mainland. There are. appar- 
ently, a few species peculiar to these islands—local species or insular 
species as they may be called. The short distance between the 
islands and the mainland would not afford a barrier to the distribu- 
tion of most plants, and those not known elsewhere are really in- 
habitants of a separated mountain range of a different geological 
formation. The adjoining coast is low, level and sandy, and the 
central mountains of the peninsula are at least thirty miles away; at 
the south no ridges approach the coast until Todos Santos is reached, 
and at the north the mountains near the coast at San Gregorio are 
- more than a hundred miles distant. These islands are masses of a 
rock different from that of the nearest mountains of the peninsula, 
and separated from them by a wide extent of low sandy country. — 
From their size and position it might be supposed that a large num- 
ber of species would prove to be peculiar to these islands, but such 
is not the case. While collecting plants extensively in the region, 
_[ have seen nearly every species of these islands growing on the ad- 
