32 The New York State College of Forestry 
to be patches or strips of conifer bog forest. They represent 
in fact “islands” or very flat ridges just high enough to be 
above the peat forming level. They are occupied by a vigor- 
ous young timber growth in which black spruce and tamarack 
are prominent — occasionally tamarack alone in rather open 
stand, just as they are on the peat soils, only of taller, moze 
rapid growth. With these are also balsam and an occasional 
white pine and popple. There is no ground cover of sphag- 
num as in the surrounding bog and the floor is sand, strewn 
thinly with forest litter or with a thin layer of quickly dried 
duff. It is quite conceivable that if the surrounding bog 
were to develop into the closed shrub stage with its more 
elevated surface the sphagnum would invade these islands. 
Possibly they may formerly have been covered with sphagnum 
and peat which has been burned down to the sand. Of the 
larger strip of shghtly elevated sand beds lying along Grasse 
River from the railway bridge to Silver Brook, a portion is 
still covered with forest which, while rather of the character 
of balsam swamp, presents, beside balsam, black spruce and 
tamarack, a noteworthy frequence of yellow birch and white 
pine, and red spruce. This seems to have been the compo- 
sition of the entire stand of this area which in recent years 
has been destroyed apparently by the back water of Grasse 
River flow. The point to be especially noted, however, is that 
the secondary sequence following destruction of the old forest 
is not at all dominated by sphagnum; that while dwarf heath 
shrub occurs — Chamaedaphne notably —on the flattest of it, 
the prominent vegetation is composed of associations of grasses 
and sedges with composites and other herbaceous species and 
with Polytrichum, Lycopodium clavatum and L. complanatum 
on the drier, bare sand exposures. 
Characteristic Species of the Non-Peat Covered Sand Plain 
On Wet Sand On Dry Sand 
Osmunda regalis (dwarfed) Polytrichum sp. (forming mats) 
Calamagrostis Canadensis Lycopodium clavatum 
Panicularia lava Lycopodium complanatum 
Carex stricta and other sedges Spiraea tomentosa 
