Some noteworthy Hepaticae from the state of Washington 



Lois Clark 



(with plate 20) 



Although Washington is the smallest of the three Pacific Coast 

 states, it has an area of over sixty-nine thousand square miles and 

 presents a great variety of climatic and physiographic conditions. 

 The Cascade Mountains divide the state into eastern and western 

 Washington. In eastern Washington the climate is hot and dry 

 in the eastern and southern portions, cool and moist in the western 

 and northern, especially along the eastern slopes of the mountains. 

 In western Washington the climate is cool and moist throughout, 

 and the whole region abounds in shaded water courses and exten- 

 sive forests. The state, therefore, throughout the greater part of 

 its extent, is exceedingly favorable for the growth of a rich hepatic 

 vegetation. 



Taking the state as a whole, there is only one small area, 

 the university campus at Seattle, where the Hepaticae have been 

 at all thoroughly collected. Other regions which have received 

 some attention are Paradise Valley on Mount Ranier, Queets 

 River valley and Elwha River valley in the Olympic Mountains, 

 and Stevens Pass in the Cascade Mountains. Elsewhere in western 

 Washington very little has been done, and in eastern Washington 

 the Hepaticae have been still more neglected. In spite of the 

 w^ork to be accomplished before our knowledge of the hepatic 

 flora approaches completion, the writer, from collections already 

 made, has been able to identify 10 1 species from the state, a 

 number which compares favorably with the 86 species known 

 from California and the 117 species known from British Columbia. 

 The most important of the collections studied were made by Pro- 



-r 



fessor O. D. Alien, Mr. A. S. Foster, and Professor T. C. Frye. 



Scarcely anything has been published on the Hepaticae of 

 Washington. Underwood's list of 1891 * enumerates 16 species, 



* A preliminary list of Pacific Coast Hepaticae. Zoc i : 361-367. 1891. 



299 



