16 SANDUSKY FLORA. 



front of the club house on Put-in-Baj by Mr. Vroman. 

 There were soft maple, oak and sycamore, some of the 

 logs four or five feet in diameter. 



SUBMERGED STALAGMITES. 



In several of the caves at Put-in-Bay nearly half a 

 mile from shore, is deep water which rises and falls with 

 fluctuations in the level of Lake Erie. The floors of 

 these caves are covered with stalagmites, and the roofs 

 were formerly studded with stalactites. In three caves 

 I have seen stalactites hanging down in the w^ater and 

 in two stalagmites rising in the water. In one cave 

 about thirty stalagmites may be seen on a submerged 

 floor of a few square rods extent. They are, most of 

 them, nearly cylindrical in shape, and represent merely 

 the cores of larger stalagmites which once probably 

 formed a crust over the whole floor, the remainder 

 having been dissolved away. Those in the deeper 

 water appear to have been dissolved more than those 

 in the shallower parts. Many were standing in water 

 from 2V2 to 3^2 feet deep, March 12 and 13, 1898. As 

 stalactites and stalagmites would not form under 

 water, the water from which the calcium carbonate 

 was precipitated to form them must have flowed to a 

 lower level than where the lowest stalagmites now 

 exist. We may therefore infer that during the period of 

 their formation, which certainly lasted many years, 

 and probably some centuries, the lake was at least five 

 feet lower than the mean level of the. past forty years. 



If these caves were formed in preglacial times, the 

 argument still holds good, for if the lake had been as 

 high or higher than now ever since the melting of the 

 glacier and stalagmites had existed in the caves then, 

 they would have been dissolved long ago. The 

 stalagmites visible now are evidenth' not preglacial. 

 Where the water does not cover the floor of the caves 

 they are forming at the present time. 



