142 Forestry Quarterly 



over, they are the species which find favorable conditions in the 

 dense beech forest. All these species are capable of living through 

 the entire rotation without ever running the risk of being entirely 

 killed out. Only in the most open stands may they recede or 

 succumb entirely in competition with the other more light-en- 

 during flora. But where the light-needing species in the open 

 stands come from requires explanation, for these are decidedly 

 immigrants. This is furnished if we consider that even in dense 

 forests there are always openings, smaller or larger, where these 

 species find satisfactory conditions or can at least subsist and they 

 get there by the usual means of distribution, wind and animals, 

 and spread from these points when further openings are made. 



Birds are responsible for the propagation of raspberries, black- 

 berries, cherries, elderberry, strawberry, and other animals carry 

 Atropa, Convallaria, Solanum, while Sanicida, Circaea, Asperula 

 wander in the pelts of animals. Peculiar hurling devices, which 

 permit seed to be thrown several yards, assist the progress of Ox- 

 alis, Impatiens, Mercurialis, Viola, Euphorbia, Gera7iiu7n. Wind 

 carries fern spores by the million for miles ; one pond may pro- 

 duce 15 million spores. Moss spores and grass seed are carried 

 similarly, the latter being not only exceedingly light but provided 

 with wings in Poa, Dactylis, Holcus. And so are carried Urtica^ 

 Seroplnilaria, Veronica, Monotropa, Hypericum, Viola, Epilobium 

 and a host of composites. On sunny days the winged seeds of these 

 plants are lifted by the warm upward air current many yards and 

 a very slight breeze will carry them miles over field, meadow, and 

 forest. And these wind-carried species are the very ones which 

 find favorable conditions in open situation. There is, therefore, 

 sufficient explanation of their occurrence and rapid spread to be 

 found without assuming a long duration of germinative power in 

 the seed. Moreover, as an experiment demonstrated, conditions 

 for rapid germination are found in the open situations, where the 

 thick, loose layer of leaves of the dense forest filled with the my- 

 celia of fungi has been tran.sformed into a compact .seedbed, which 

 gives chance for immediate germination. 



It was also found that the soil flora in the forest is made up 

 largely by perennial species, from 80 to 96% being of this descrip- 

 tion, and in the number of individuals the annuals and perennials 

 are even to a greater extent outstripped by the perennials. 

 This fact insures to a high degree the permanency of the existing^ 

 soil flora, especially as in the forest shade even annuals and bien- 

 nials become perennial. 



