DRY GRASSLAND OF A HIGH MOUNTAIN PARK IN 



NORTHERN COLORADO 



FRANCIS RAMALEY 



University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado 



The dry grassland here considered is one of a number of 

 associations in a mountain park, Boulder Park, at Tolland, 

 Colorado, the seat of the University of Colorado Mountain 

 Laboratory. In addition to the dry grassland there are sedge 

 moor, willow scrub, meadow and various other^ plant com- 

 munities,- Since conditions are much the same as in other 

 high mountain parks of Colorado the study bears upon problems 

 larger than those of the immediate locality. 



The work on which this paper is based has been carried on 

 regularly beginning with 1912, the most intensive work having 

 been done during the three summers from 1913 to 1915 inclusive. 

 Examination has also been made of dry grassland in other 

 places at altitudes from 5000 feet to 9000 feet, but a report on 

 altitudinal differences is reserved for a later time. 



Boulder Park (fig. 1) is an open woodless valley about two 

 miles long and three-quarters of a mile wide closed in by for- 

 ested hills of pine and spruce. The altitude above sea level at 

 the railway station of Tolland is 8889 feet. This is about 

 3500 feet above the plains, 20 miles to the east. Through the 

 floor of the park flows South Boulder Creek, here a slow-moving 

 meandering stream, but which in the canyons above and below 

 dashes rapidly along its bed of boulders and broken rock. 



At one time local glaciers came down from the Continental 



^ Ramaley, Francis, Remarks on some northern Colorado plant communities, 

 etc. Univ. Colo. Studies 7: 228-236, 1910. 



2 The writer uses the word "community" in a large sense, to mean any definite 

 vegetation grouping; an "association" is a community characterized by broad 

 and general features; while a "society" is a community of rather narrow limits. 



249 



THE PLANT WORLD, VOL. 19, SO. 9 

 SEPTEMBER, 1916 



