° 1912 J TowNSEND, Summer Birds of the St. John Valley, N. B. 17 



almost mountainous and forest clad shores of the southern por- 

 tions, beginning close to the city of St. John and extending upwards 

 for about thirty miles, to the more pastoral scenery where the 

 river is bordered by a flood plain, and where the islands, instead 

 of being rocky and forested as in the south, are low-lying mud 

 banks on which hay in great c^uantities is produced. Back of 

 this flood region the gently sloping hills are largely given up to 

 farming, while the forest recedes to the background. The forest 

 is chiefly spruce — white, black and red — and balsam fir, with 

 arbor vitse and larches in places, and an occasional white pine 

 and hemlock. Canoe, white and yellow birches, beeches, rock 

 maples, mountain ashes and poplars also form parts of the forest. 

 All of these trees in the lower, wilder regions of the valley some- 

 times attain considerable dimensions, especially in that portion 

 back of Glenwood and Upper Greenwich. Beginning at Glenwood, 

 red oaks become common in the river valley, while the graceful 

 wineglass-shaped x\merican elm is the most conspicuous tree on 

 the low shores and islands, and an occasional butternut and linden 

 are to be seen. 



Recent subsidences has depressed this whole region to such an 

 extent that the former river cutting has become an estuary of 

 the sea, the force of whose tides are felt even to Fredericton, a 

 distance of eighty-four miles. 



While the region of the city of St. John and the hills back of it 

 are cooled by the proximity of the Bay of Fundy with its rushing 

 tides and frequent fogs, the broad alluvial central valley has a 

 more genial summer climate, as shown by a comparison of the 

 mean summer temperature in Fredericton and St. John. The 

 average of the mean temperature for the month of May in the 

 years 1901, 1902, 1904 and 1905 was 2.4° Far. higher at Fredericton 

 than at St. John. In June of these years it was 2.5° higher, while 

 in July it was 5° higher in Fredericton than in St. John. 



As a result of this proximity of two such unlike summer climates 

 there is an admixture here of Boreal and Transition species. As 

 long ago as 1869 (Am. Naturalist, Vol. Ill, 1869, p. 331), the late 

 Mr. Henry A. Purdie suggested that some birds not common on 

 the central and southern Maine coast may have reached the north- 

 ern coast of Maine bv the "Saint Lawrence and Maine Central 



