6o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



(mostly of one species^ Woodwardia Virginica), sedges, sundews, 

 pitcher-plants, etc. The pitcher-plants {Sarracenia minor and S. psit- 

 tacina) grow two or three times as large in Okefinokee as they do any- 

 where else. The leaves of S. minor, which had never been known to 

 grow more than a foot tall in the pine-barrens, often attain a height of 

 over three feet in the swamp. The ground in these bogs is everywhere 

 covered with a dense soft carpet of sphagnum. 



Where the swamp muck has reached a depth of three or four feet 

 the pines can no longer exist, and the cypress grows much more densely 

 than it does in the bogs, constituting the bulk of the vegetation. Such 

 places are known locally as "bays." There the long moss (TiUandsia 

 usneoides) drapes every tree, though it never grows as luxuriantly as 

 in calcareous or alluvial regions in the same latitude. The shrubs, 

 herbs and mosses in the bays are much the same as in the bogs already 

 described, though considerably less abundant. One shrub deserves 

 special mention on account of its peculiar habit. It is Pieris phillyrei- 

 folia, a handsome little evergreen of the heath family, confined to 

 Georgia, Florida and Alabama. It sometimes stands erect, two or 

 three feet tall, but usually it starts at the base of a cypress tree, and its 

 stems insinuate themselves between the inner and outer layers of the 

 bark of the tree, gradually working upward to a height of thirty or 

 forty feet from the ground, and sending out branches with leaves and 

 flowers every few feet. Growing in this way the shrub might easily 

 be taken for a parasite, but its stems can always be traced down to the 

 ground, and they bear no rootlets and never penetrate to the living 

 part of the bark. As far as known this manner of climbing has no 

 parallel in the whole vegetable kingdom. 



Where the sandy bottom of the swamp lies six feet or more below 

 the average water level no trees can grow, and we have what are known 

 as " prairies." The prairies are all in the eastern half of the swamp, 

 where their aggregate area is perhaps as much as a hundred square 

 miles. In wet weather the water covers them so that one can go almost 

 anywhere in a shallow boat, especially by following the " 'gator roads," 

 or trails made by the alligators ; but when the water is low the prairies 

 are impassable for boats while still too boggy to walk in. This being 

 the case at the time of our visit we could only view them from the banks 

 of the canal. The bulk of the vegetation in the prairies consists of 

 "maiden cane" {Panicum digUarioides),^ interspersed with "fire- 

 leaf" or "bull-tongue" {Orontium aquaticum), " wampee " or pick- 

 erel weed (Pontederia) , white Avater-lilies {Castalia), and numerous 

 other characteristic aquatic plants. There seems to be no sphagnum, 

 perhaps because it will not grow without shade in that latitude. The 



* The true cane {Arundinaria) , which is said to be very abundant in Dismal 

 Swamp, seems to be entirely absent from Okefinokee, as it is from the Everglades. 



