310 Puget Sound Marine Sta. Pub. Voi,. 1, No. 27 



8 included a trip over the bed in a rowboat. All observations reported 

 were made by the writer except as otherwise noted. 



2. FIELD OBSERVATIONS 



1. October, 1914. Extreme high tide with no waves of consequence. 

 Kelp plainly visible from the shore. The bulbs and fronds formed a dense 

 mass at the surface. Length of bed estimated at 700 feet. 



2. April 20, 1915. Low tide (+2.2 ft.). Water fairly quiet. Not 

 a single kelp either old or young could be seen, although from the boat 

 Fucus could be plainly seen in the water only a few feet further toward 

 the shore than the edge of the bed as seen on visit No. 1. 



3. April 30, 1915. Low tide ( — 0.1 ft). Water quiet. No plants 

 cf the previous season were found but plenty of young ones were seen. 

 Eleven plants of representative sizes were measured. Their lengths were 

 as follows: Maximum, 171 inches; minimum, 10 inches; average, 54 inches. 

 Many kelps were entirely exposed at this state of the tide. There was 

 an exposed zone about 15 feet wide in which kelps were abundant among 

 Laminaria, Gigartina and other species of algae. This same algal as- 

 sociation, including the kelps, extended below low tide and it was found 

 that it was very difficult to see young kelps when they are under water 

 and among other plants. A rise of two feet in the tide would cover 

 the zone occupied by this association, hence it is probable that there were 

 young kelps here on April 20, but that they escaped observation on account 

 of the higher tide (a difference of 2.3 ft.) and the slight disturbance of 

 the surface of the water by waves. 



A careful search was made for "fruiting" specimens, i. e., plants 

 that had begun to produce spores, but only one was found. The specimen 

 was 114 inches long. It had one or two soral patches on nearly every 

 frond. No soral patches had come out of any of the fronds and prob- 

 ably no spores had been discharged. Numerous small kelps 12 to 24 

 inches long were seen floating. As these specimens, even including the 

 holdfasts, were intact, it was evident that their anchorage had failed. 



4. Ma^ 29, 1915. Low tide ( — 1.1ft.). Water fairly quiet. Meas- 

 ured 13 plants. Their lengths were as follows: Maximum, 25 feet; min- 

 imum, 3 feet ; average, 1 1 feet. Although the tide was lower than dur- 

 ing visit No. 3, no kelp plants could be found exposed. The zone above 

 low tide in which numerous kelps were found a month before was gone 

 over carefully but not a single kelp was found in it. 



Of the 13 kelps measured. 7 were in some stage of s^jore production 

 ("fruiting"). Of these seven, 4 showed only a very few soral patches, in- 

 dicating that fruiting was just beginning in them. The remaining three 



