1914] Collins,— Drifting Algae 3 
recent paper ! is concerned chiefly with algae that have a definite and 
prolonged unattached existence, usually with change of form from that 
of the fixed state, to adapt the plant to the unattached state; the possi- 
bility of transportation to considerable distances is however also dis- 
cussed. "That unless this possibility is taken into account one may be 
led into serious errors, was shown me by a recent experience. 
On October 8, 1913, I visited the ocean shore of Eastham, Massa- 
chusetts, near the Nauset lighthouse. From Chatham to Highland 
Light in Truro the shore stretches for about 25 miles in a nearly 
straight line; a rather steep beach of shifting sand, overlooked by 
sand dunes. No algae ever grow here, and as off shore the bottom is 
the same loose sand with more or less shifting bars a short distance out, 
the occurrence of algae below low water mark is improbable. All I 
had found on my many visits here had been scraps, more or less bat- 
tered, the same as one might find floating anywhere in Massachusetts 
Bay or Nantucket Sound. But on this occasion as I looked from the 
dunes I saw plants of good size washing up and down in the waves, 
and on going down I found to my surprise that the beach was strewn 
with Laminaria, and that not L. Agardhii Kjell., the common species 
of southern New England, but L. longicruris De la Pyl., a northern 
species, occurring south of Nahant only at a few isolated stations. 
They were not battered and waterworn plants, but perfectly fresh, 
and were of all sizes from young plants 3-4 dm. high, to mature 
individuals, with stipe alone over three meters long. The small 
plants were often in clumps of a number of individuals, still attached 
at base to shells or pebbles; the laminae often bore abundant fruit. 
Along with the Laminaria were, almost equally abundant, but from 
their smaller stature less conspicuous, Fucus vesiculosus L., Ascophyl- 
lum nodosum (L.) Le Jolis, Desmarestia aculeata (L.) Lamour., and 
Rhodymenia palmata (L.) Grev. There had been a heavy surf for 
several days, and my first thought was that some colony in deeper 
water had been struck by it, but from what I knew of the bottom, 
I concluded that this would be very unlikely; moreover Fucus and 
Ascophyllum are litoral plants. They occur more or less all along 
the southern New England coast, but I know no station except New- 
port, Rhode Island, where the plants are at all luxuriant; usually they 
are much smaller than the northern form, or than the plants now in 
1 Schiller, Ueber Algentransport und Migrationsformationen im Meere. Inter- 
nationale Revue der gesamten H ydrobiologie und Hydrographie, Vol. II, p. 62, 1909. 
