GEOGRAPHY OF CENTRAL FLORinA 1/7 



etc. The amount of lime in the soil must be comi)aratively small, 

 for except where the rock outcrops are very abundant the vegeta- 

 tion does not differ greatly in aspect or composition from that of 

 the non-calcareous flatwoods. Only a small part of this soil is cul- 

 tivated at present, but it seems to be very well suited for vegetables 

 of many kinds. 



Sand and rock idth humus. The greater part of the soil of the 

 great Gulf Hammock of Levy County (fig 5), and perhaps 

 many other level hammocks, seems to have been originally 

 damp sand with limestone protruding through it, though the 

 relative amount of sand may have been less than in the flat- 

 w^oods, and indeed wiithout extensive explorations it would be 

 hard to say how much of it belongs to the marly type described 

 a little farther on. Anyway, the dense forests now established 

 in such places furnish their own protection from fire and form a 

 great deal of humus, which differentiates the soil further from 

 that of the flatwoods. 'Mechanical analyses 4 and 5 ("Park- 

 wood fine sandy loam") represent this type pretty well. When 

 cleared it makes a good trucking soil, like the preceding. 



Clayey soils. A little north of the center of Marion County, 

 particularly around Burbank, there are a few square miles of flat- 

 woods with decidedly clayey soil. This type has been seen by the 

 writer only from the train, but its vegetation seems to differ from 

 that of sandy flatwoods chiefly in the scarcity of sawf-palmetto. 

 The land has been utilized to some extent for truck- farming. 

 Toward Silver Spring this passes into a sort of low hammock with 

 short-leaf pine and cabbage palmetto,* somewhat suggesting a river 

 or creek bottom. This last, represented by mechanical analyses 44 

 and 45, is called "Fellowship clay" in the soil survey of the "Ocala 

 area," though it bears little resemblance to anything around Fel- 

 lowship P. O., which is on the uplands in a different region, sev- 

 eral miles away. 



Marly soils. On and near Merritt's Island there are consider- 

 able areas of damp or wet marly soils, whose texture, composition 

 and depth are little known. The vegetation is mostly of the tvpe 

 designated farther on as palm savanna. Some similar vegetation, 

 presumably indicating similar soil conditions, occurs in the Gulf 

 hammock region within a few miles of the coast, for example be- 



*Described in 7th Annual Report, pp. 178-179. 



