SUMMARY 



Cape Breton is situated northeast of the peninsula of Nova 

 Scotia. In northern Cape Breton two topographic regions 

 can be distinguished : the Highland and the Lowland. The 

 highland includes primarily the lofty interior plateau, which 

 rises to an average elevation of more than a thousand feet and is 

 underlain by crystalline rocks of Laurentian age. In places this 

 extends clear to the sea, but along much of the coast there is an 

 intervening border of Carboniferous lowland, of varying width, 

 between the highland and the shore. The entire area has been 

 glaciated, drift being encountered on all sides in the lowland 

 but much less frequently on the plateau. 



The climate of the region as a whole may be classed as cool 

 temperate maritime. The climate of the plateau differs from 

 that of the lowland in the lower mean temperatures, greater 

 daily range of temperature, shorter growing season,' heavier 

 precipitation, and generally lower humidity, this latter being 

 attributable in large measure to the prevalence of low-lying cloud 

 banks. 



Considered from a phytogeographical point of view. Cape 

 Breton lies near the northern border of the Transition Forest 

 Region of eastern North America. In northern Cape Breton, 

 owing chiefly to the differences in climate mentioned above, both 

 the Deciduous Forest Climatic Formation and the Northeastern 

 Evergreen Coniferous Forest Climatic Formation are well 

 represented, the former in the lowland, the latter in the high- 

 land. These formations, as developed in northern Cape Breton, 

 are treated separately. 



The scheme adopted in classifying the plant associations of 

 these two regions is outlined in the table of contents and has 

 been discussed in some detail in another paper (Nichols '17). 



The regional climax association-type in the lowland is a mixed 

 deciduous-evergreen forest, comprising sometimes a dozen differ- 

 ent trees, of which the following species are most characteristic : 

 Fagus grandifolia, Acer saccharum, Betula hitea, Abies balsamea, 

 Tsuga canadensis, and Finns Strobus. All of these trees grow 

 vigorously and to good size. The woody undergrowth in the 

 forest includes, as the commoner species, Acer spicatum and 

 A. pennsylvanicum, Taxns canadensis and Coryhis rostrata. 



