4 ERYTHEA. 



some places even to six feet, in height. Between them the ground 

 is mostly bare, except that here and there a tuft of grass finds pro- 

 tection in the base of a bush, from voracious sheep and Jack-rabbits; 

 there were indications, also, of the presence of an ephemeral 

 spring flora. But few species of herbaceous perennial plants occur. 

 Not a tree or bush is to be seen over the whole valley, except at the 

 extreme west end of the lake, where a few Lombardy poplars have 

 been planted around ranch-houses, and where willows occasionally 

 skirt the sloughs. The mountains to the north are likewise bare of 

 trees, and are clothed with the same apparently endless garment of 

 Gray Sage, Artemisia tridentata, and its associate shrubs, which pre- 

 vails over the whole western portion of the Great Basin ; the only 

 taller plants are a few bushes of Juniperus Californica, from five 

 to ten feet high, scattered here and there. The vegetation of the 

 valley produces a general effect of weird gray monotony, and the 

 projecting masses of brown lava on the hillsides add to the bleak 

 loneliness of the scene. The only relief to the eye, from the gen- 

 eral grayness, is obtained from the vivid green of the greasewood, 

 the verdant patches of Salt Grass, Distichlis spicata, the columns of 

 steam rising from the hot springs, and the view on the south of the 

 steep northern slope of the Sierra Nevada, snow-capped, and clothed 

 with an extensive but not dense forest. This forest is composed of 

 Yellow Pine, probably Pinus Jeffreyi, with some Pinus ponderosa 

 scopulorum, among which occur both Red Fir, probably Abies mag- 

 nified, and what is locally called White Fir, A. concolor Lowiana(7) 



THE ALKALI SOILS. 



Comparing the flora of the alkali soils in the Honey Lake 

 Valley, at an altitude of 4,000 feet, with those in the Upper San 

 Joaquin, only 400 feet above sea level, one is struck by the absence 

 of certain common species of the latter region. In the Honey 

 Lake Valley we failed to find any Fra.nkenia, Allenrolfea, Kochia 

 Californica, Sporobolus airoides, Sporobolus asperifolius, Salicomia, 

 or Bigelovia veneta, while in their stead there were Sarcobatus ver- 

 miculatus, Kochia Americana, Triglochin concinna, Elymus triti- 

 coides, Bigelovia graveolens, the allied "Chrysocoma nauseosa," an 

 annual Suaeda, and Iva axillaris, none of which, unless it be the 

 last named, appear to occur in the Upper San Joaquin. 



