PRAIRIE FORESTATION. 345 



PRAIRIE FORESTATION. 



LYCURGUS R. MOYER, MONTEVIDEO. 



A prairie has been defined to be an undulating, grass-cov- 

 erd plain, as distinguished from a tree-covered plain on the one 

 hand and from a semi-arid plain, or steppe, on the other. A 

 forest is a tract of land covered with a natural growth of trees. 

 The word "forestation" does not seem to be found in the diction- 

 ary, but it is doubtless intended to refer to the tendency shown 

 by all prairies to become covered with trees. 



The northwestern prairies, those that we are familiar with, 

 are covered for the most part with a thick covering of boulder- 

 clay, sand and gravel, deposited during the glacial epoch, and 

 familiarly known as the drift. Geologically speaking there is 

 but little difference between the formation of the prairie and that 

 of the adjoining forested area. Throughout Minnesota, or at 

 least throughout the greater portion of the state, the same drift 

 formation underlies them both. 



It is likely that before the drift period much of what is now in 

 the prairie regions was covered with trees. Indeed old tree- 

 trunks and stumps are frequently found throughout the glaciated 

 area deeply buried in the drift. 



The great northern forest encircles the globe, extending 

 across each continent from ocean to ocean. On our continent 

 one arm of this great forest extends south along the Coast 

 Range Mountains, and another arm extends along the Rocky 

 Mountains quite to the Mexican border. Toward the east 

 another and a wider arm of this forest swept to the south and 

 covered all the Atlantic states. It is to the west of this great 

 Atlantic forest and to the south of the great Arctic forest that 

 the prairie regions are situated. The prairies extend westward 

 to about the looth meridian, where the plains region may be 

 said to begin. 



The line between the forest and the prairie crosses the 

 northern boundary of Minnesota about fifteen miles east of 

 Emerson and St ^^incent, and extends southeasterly by the way 

 of Thief River Falls to White Earth Agenc}'. It then extends 

 to the south by the way of Detroit and Pelican Rapids to Fergus 

 Falls, and thence southeasterly near Alexandria, Litchfield, and 

 Glencoe, to Blue Earth County, where the line turns to the east- 

 ward, and then to the northeast, entering the state of Wisconsin 

 near Hudson. 



