Rbodora 
JOURNAL OF 
THE NEW ENGLAND BOTANICAL CLUB 
Vol. 15. April, 1913. No. 172. 
SOME PLANTS OF THE SOUTHBURY TRIASSIC AREA. 
E. B. HARGER. 
THE small area of Triassic sandstone with its accompanying trap 
ridges, which lies in the towns of Southbury and Woodbury, Connecti- 
eut, has long been of interest to geologists, and full descriptions of it 
from a geological point of view may be found in publications of the 
U. S. Geological Survey. 
During the past few years the writer has had occasional opportuni- 
ties for botanizing in parts of this area, and has found it unusually 
rich in species rare in the state and in New England. 
The area underlaid by Triassic rocks is roughly oval in outline and 
is some six miles in length (north and south) by about three miles 
in width. It is generally below the level of the surrounding country 
and is divided into an eastern and a western valley by a group of trap 
ridges which run a little east of north through the central part. A 
small river, the Pomperaug, is formed at the northerly end of the 
valley by the junction of smaller tributaries and flows at first south- 
westwardly in the western valley but soon turning passes through a 
break in the central ridge and flows southerly through the eastern 
valley, then turning westerly sweeps in a broad curve around the end 
of the central highland and entering the western valley again flows 
northward as if bent on returning to its source. After about a mile, 
however, it turns in an acute angle to the southwest and enters the 
Housatonic river opposite its circuit of the ridge. 
Three villages lie in the area,— Woodbury in the western valley 
at the north, Southbury in the central and southern part of the eastern 
valley, and South Britain in the southerly part of the western valley. 
The towns of Southbury and Woodbury divide the area between them, 
