SPHAGNUM BOGS OF ALASKA 173 



ing of the cannery within the last few years and the necessity of 

 transporting the fish to this cannery by rail because of the sand 

 bar at the mouth of the Situk River. 



Funston did, however, find small treeless areas in the forest 

 w^hich he describes as follows: ''Scattered through the forests 

 of the Yakutat Bay region are a number of small open treeless 

 spots varying from a few square rods to an acre or two in extent. 

 The larger of these glades are generally swampy and in some of 

 them water is standing all summer, while olhers are well drained 

 and there is no apparent reason for the lack of forest growth. 

 These glades are few in number and occupy in the aggregate an 

 extremely small percentage of the total forest area." 



Kalmia glauca is much smaller here than it is in the Puget 

 Sound bogs and does not form such dense growths. The same 

 is true of Ledum palustre as compared with its congeners in the 

 bogs of the Puget Sound region. The representatives of both 

 of these genera are rather inconspicuous in the sphagnum bogs of 

 the Yakutat region and also in the sphagnum bogs at Dixon 

 Harbor. 



An attempt was made to collect bog water here as had been done 

 in the Puget Sound bogs,^'* but on digging down to the gravel no 

 water at all had seeped into the cavity after a wait of fifteen 

 minutes. 



It seems quite possible that the treeless condition of this tundra 

 as a whole is connected with its physiographic history. The 

 gravelly glacial outwash, in its original condition evidently could 

 furnish little opportunity for the growth of woody plants of any 

 size. It seems possible that the mosses were the pioneers here, 

 and that they early produced a condition on this gravelly fiat 

 where there was plenty of moisture but not enough drainage to 

 permit the grow^th of trees. It would seem difficult, too, for trees to 

 maintain their erect position with the poor anchorage for their 

 roots afforded by the soft thin layer of soil, but they have done so 

 in the case of the clusters referred to above. The mosses were 

 actually found to be pioneers on a gravel plain in front of Grewingk 



" Rigg, G. B., The effect of some puget sound bog waters on the root hairs 

 of Tradescaniia. Bot. Gaz. 55: 314-326. 1913. 



