Dec, 1922.] Weiss & West: Insects of a Moist Woods. 171 



Highlands and the Piedmont Plateau is called the Piedmont Plain. 

 Figure i shows the geographic provinces of the state. 



Monmouth Junction, where the survey was made, is located on the 

 lower edge or border of the Piedmont Plain about ten miles below 

 New Brunswick. This Plain is " chiefly a lowland of gently rounded 

 hills separated by wide valleys with some ridges and isolated hills 

 rising conspicuously above the general surface, which slopes gently 

 from about 400 feet above sea level at its northwestern margin to 

 about 100 feet along its southeastern border near the Delaware and to 

 sea level about Newark Bay." ^ 



The rocks of the different parts of the Piedmont Plain differ widely 

 in age. The section surveyed lies very close to if not on the line 

 separating the trap rock and shale formations. The shale is baked 

 for some distance from the trap intrusion and its color and physical 

 characteristics changed until it somewhat resembles trap rock. The 

 soil towards the surface may be either washed from the trap rock 

 hills at the back or may be partly broken down, baked shale. 



Hollick - outlines three forest zones for New Jersey, the deciduous 

 zone, the tension zone and the coniferous zone. The tension zone is 

 bounded by an irregular line drawn from a little east of Metuchen 

 to Trenton and a similar one from Long Branch to Salertl. North of 

 the first line will be found the typical deciduous region and south of 

 the second line, the typical coniferous zone. Between the two lines 

 is an area about sixteen miles wide " which may be termed the tension 

 zone because it is there that the two floras meet and overlap, produc- 

 ing a constant state of strain or tension in the struggle for advan- 

 tage." Within the limits of either the deciduous or coniferous zone, 

 the typical characteristic species of each have become firmly estab- 

 lished and conditions are more or less uniform. The forests of the 

 Piedmont Plain are deciduous and according to Smith (Insects of 

 New Jersey, p. 28) insect life is less abundant than to the north or 

 south. Part of it is largely under cultivation and has many large 

 swamp areas and low meadow regions. 



The surveyed area consisted of about twenty-two acres of gently 

 sloping, moist woods and thicket just above or on the southern border 

 of the deciduous zone. The woods occupied about fifteen acres and 



1 Lewis and Kummel, Bui. 14. Geol. Survey N. J., p. 28. 



2 Ann. Rept. State Geol. N. J., 1899, pp. 177-201. 



