10 The New York State College of Lorestry 
not only a better growth of the black spruce and tamarack but 
to allow the entrance of species — balsam for example — of 
greater value. In any event such an investigation serves to 
add to our knowledge of the phenomena of forest development. 
There are also these considerations that the peat itself has a 
very large potential fuel value and that where drainage is 
feasible, peat beds may become valuable agricultural soils. The 
zericultural value is, however, of uncertain status in the 
Adirondack region because of the prevalence of killing frosts 
late in spring and early in fall. The season of probable freedom 
from killing frosts would apparently not exceed sixty days and 
in many situations would fall below that. Before Adirondack 
peat lands are exploited for agricultural purposes it will be 
necessary to determine the extent of risk of killing frosts and 
_ to find what crop plants would be suitable for the conditions 
which obtain in the low lying areas where peat beds oceur.* 
30g areas, that is, areas where peat beds are formed and 
consequently where bog vegetation occurs, constitute a very con- 
siderable percentage of the total area of the Adirondacks. That 
is to say, the Adirondack region is a part of the large area in 
the northern States and Canada where conditions of climate 
and topography and possibly also the postglacial status of plant 
species favor bog development. The vast scale on which 
glacial leveling and filling occurred which resulted in inter- 
rupted drainage and in a multitude of lakes resulted also in 
low lving poorly drained areas where, either at the beginning 
of vegetation invasion or after the pioneer vegetation had 
wrought certain changes in the substratum, the peat nosses — 
Sphagnum species— entered and thenceforth dominated the 
“While it is not within the scope of this bulletin to consider in 
detail the agricultural utilization of peat lands, the extensive areas of 
such lands not only in the Adirondack region, but throughout New York 
State, offers a field of agricultural development whose profitable outcome 
is being demonstrated by numerous truck gardening projects outside the 
Adirondacks. In the further expansion of this reclamation of peat lands, 
it is, of course, only a matter of time when the peat soils of the colder 
Adirondack districts will come into consideration. Readers interested in 
this aspect of the subject will find a valuable reference in a recent bul- 
letin by F. J. Alway on Agricultural Value and Reclamation of Min- 
nesota Peat Soils, The University of Minnesota Agricultural Experiment 
Station Bulletin 188, pp. 1-136, 1920, with its extended list of references. 
