THE STAGE SETTING 



./. N lOinkin. Jr. 



A slow-ilowing stream presents a habitat for characteristic plants ami animals 

 adapted to this type of environment. Head i)afjes ."5-1. 



plants and only occasional bass, pickerel, or minnows. A few 

 dragonfly nymphs live under the small stones in shallow water, while 

 ninnerous snails (Campeloma) are foimd buried in the sand or crawl- 

 ing along the bottom.^ It is possible to collect a few specimens of 

 plankton, which consists of minute free-swimming or floating organ- 

 isms, but, on the whole, it is a relatively inhospitable environment 

 inhabited by comparatively few organisms. 



Within a few yards of this beach the stream flows gently over a 

 shallow sandbar, flanked by cattails and rushes. Here are nimierous 

 representatives of several groups of plants : in the water a \'ariety 

 of algae, Spirogyra (pond scum), streaming filaments of Ocdogonium, 

 Oscillatoria, and Cladophora, and iimiunerable unicellular organisms, 

 such as desmids and diatoms. Water cress, water plantain, water 

 smart-weed, and burr-weed grow along the banks, while in sheltered 

 bays the surface of the water may be covered with duckwec'd or per- 

 haps yellow and white water lilies. H(>re and there in boggy i)I;ic(>s 

 are dense masses of cattails, yellow flowering rushes, and numerons 

 sedges, while on the banks are fotmd grasses of se\'eral species. 



'It is expected that the student will make free use of IV, ' Roll Call." for cencral idcntiBcation 

 and of the books of reference noted for more intimate and exact classification. 



