gradually from west to east. As a consequence, the 

 black-water stream systems that drain the peninsula 

 are relatively short and slow-flowing. 



The development of extensive Atlantic white 

 cedar wetlands on the western sector of the Dare 

 Peninsula, rather than to the east where pocosin 

 vegetation dominates, appears to be related to the 



historic and contemporary flooding of the region 

 rather than to depth of peat, soil series, or fire history, 

 since the latter parameters are quite similar in both 

 sections (Peacock and Lynch 1982). The complex 

 interactions of organic soils, water flow, and de- 

 velopment of the distinctive nonalluvial swamp 

 forests of the peatlands, as condensed from Peacock 

 and Lynch (1982), follow. 



Figure 39. General soil types of mainland Dare County (from USAGE 1982). 



71 



