REVIEWS 



The Indicator Significance of Native Vegetation in the Determina- 

 tion of Forest Sites. By C. F. Korstian. Reprint from the Plant 

 World, Vol. XX, No. 9, 19 17. 



A century ago when people from New England went West to settle 

 the Ohio Valley and the Southern Lake States they searched for land 

 covered with beech and hard maple. To them these trees were "indi- 

 cators" of site quality for the production of corn and wheat. Those 

 who settled on land covered with beech and hard maple fared much 

 better than those who settled on land where oak and pine were domi- 

 nant. The farmer has from earliest times looked upon trees and lesser 

 plants as indicators of the quality of the soil for the production of 

 agricultural crops. 



European foresters have for at least a century gauged the quality of 

 the soil for the production of forest crops from the characteristic forms 

 of lesser vegetation. Thus Oxalis in Prussia has been looked upon for 

 generations as an indicator of site quality. Heyer in his "Bodenkunde," 

 published in 1856, emphasizes the significance of indigenous plants as 

 indicators of site quality. Ratzeburg, in 1859, published a good-sized 

 volume under the title "Standortsgewachse," treating the subject /;/ cx- 

 tenso. Ramann, in 1893, in his "Bodenkunde" devotes a number of 

 pages to "Bodenbestimmende Pflanzen," which may be liberally trans- 

 lated as "soil-determining plants or indicators." 



In reading Korstian's article the reviewer is left with the impression 

 that the use of plants as indicators of soil quality is new to forestry. 

 He says : "In the perusal of forestry literature one is impressed with 

 the apparent fact that until only recently has much attention been given 

 to the native vegetation, aside from forest trees themselves, in the clas- 

 sification and segregation of forest sites." 



Although the plant ecologist has only recently made use of indigenous 

 plants as indicators of soil quality favorable or unfavorable for par- 

 ticular crops, the forester has long made use of native plants, both 

 herbaceous and perennial, as indicators of soil ([uality. favorable or 

 unfavorable for particular ff)rcst crops, as indicated by the writings 

 cited above. 



Although Shantz, in 191 i, in a hulUtin published by the I'. S. De- 

 partment of .Agriculture, shf)wc-(l ihr \ahu' of native vegetation as an 



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