THE TREE WILLOWS OF ALASKA 279 



Wrangcll. — Only a few specimens, and these closely grazed by 

 cattle (426).' 



Stephens Passage. — Abundant in Taku Harbor (481). 



Skagway. — On the lower mountain slopes. 



Juneau. — Abundant in Silver Bow Basin and occurring on the ad- 

 jacent mountain slopes as far as 1400 feet above sea level (566, 594, 



2534)- 



Glacier Bay. — Abundant all about the bay on soil once denuded by 



the glaciers but now in process of reclothing with vegetation (624, 



69S, 701). Normally here a shrub three to five feet high, and on the 



gravels recently emerged from the retreating Muir Glacier and on a 



' nunatak ' in the same glacier even occurring almost prostrate. On the 



east side of Muir Inlet, about six miles below the glacier and at an 



elevation of about 500 feet, occurred a tree five inches in diameter and 



about fifty years old. 



Sitka. — Scattered along Indian River below the rapids (838). It 

 was undoubtedly here that Henry Mertens, the botanist of Captain 

 Llitke's Expedition, in an excursion from Sitka to the summit of the 

 neighboring Mount Verstovia, in the year 1827, discovered this willow. 

 And here the writer on June 16, 1899, on a similar excursion found it 

 still growing. The dense forests of spruce about Sitka do not afford 

 suitable conditions for the tree, and it was not observed at any other 

 point in the vicinity, the same situation as in Mertens' time, for he says, 

 " Here alone [at the crossing of a ' wild mountain current'] is seen the 

 solitary species of Salix which the environs of Sitcha afford." ^ 



Takutat Bay. — Abundant along the west shore (1121, 1154), at the 

 Hubbard Glacier (1082), and at Hidden Glacier (998, 999). 



Prince William Sound. — Sparingly on the moraine of Columbia 

 Glacier ; seen also by Dr. Merriam at Port Wells. 



Cook hilet. — Sparingly on the delta of a glacier in Halibut Cove, 

 Kachemak Bay. 



Kadiak. — Abundant at Eagle Bay, about 10 miles south of the town 

 of Kadiak, along a stream-bottom wooded with balm of gilead trees, 

 the trunks of individual willows here reaching a diameter of six to 

 eight inches (1440). 



The wood of the satin willow is sometimes used by the Indians of 

 the southern Alaska coast in the drying of salmon, since the smoke does 



1 The numbers given, unless 'otherwise specified, refer to the collection of 

 Frederick V. Coville and Thomas H. Kearney, Jr., made on the Harriman Ex- 

 pedition. 



2 See Hooker, Bot. Misc. 3 : 18. 1S33. 



