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HINTS AND NOTES 



right angles more or less to the main bank, 

 and the part played by plants that help to 

 stabilize the newly-formed shingle, such as 

 Shrubby Sea Elite, is of the greatest interest. 

 The work of this natural shore preserver, ably 

 described by Prof. F. W. Oliver at Blakeney, 

 is of supreme importance. 



The plants that are most frequently found 

 upon shingle beaches on the east and south 

 coasts of England are Yellow Horned Poppy, 

 Sea Kale, Sea Rocket, Sea Campion, Sea 

 Purslane, Sea Holly, Orache, Curled Dock, 

 Ragwort, Marram, Seaside Wormwood. The 

 latter in some places, as at Salthouse, helps to 

 establish embryonic dunes where the Shrubby 

 Sea Elite is less dominant. 



The Sand Dunes. The sand dune is just as 

 local along the British coasts as the shingle 

 beach. Sand dunes, in the same way as 

 shingle beaches, owe their preservation, once 

 they are accumulated, to the action of a few 

 dominant plants that in this case help to 

 bind them together by the development of 

 long rhizomes which reach far down into and 

 amongst the loose sand, and by interlacing 

 and constant multiplication form a strong 

 and resistant barrier (when compared with the 

 sand) to the further effect of the wind. 



Whilst shingle beaches are a direct product 

 of marine action, dunes on the coast are due 

 to aeolian agency, though the material is di- 

 rectly brought into its position upon the coast 

 by the same agency, or the sea. Dunes are 

 if anything of much quicker growth than 

 shingle beaches, and as readily destroyed in 

 the absence of binding Grass rhizomes. So 

 important is the office of Marram, Lyme 

 Grass, &c., in binding the sand together that 

 there was once a law made to prevent these 

 useful plants from being destroyed. In such 

 low-lying countries as Holland such a law is 

 of primal importance. 



The plants that are found most commonly 

 on sand dunes are Saltwort (also on sandy 

 shores), Seaside Bindweed, Sea Buckthorn, 

 the Creeping Willow (acting as a sand binder 

 in Anglesey), Sand Sedge (a most useful sand 

 binder), Marram, Lyme Grass, Rushy Wheat 

 Grass, Squirrel Tail Grass. Others not de- 

 scribed in detail here are Sea Campion, Sea 

 Purslane, Sea Rocket, and Sandhill Cat's 

 Tail. 



The Salt Marsh. The salt marsh is as a 

 rule protected from the sea by a shingle 

 beach, or dune, or sandy bank, or line of cliffs, 

 but usually one or other of the former. It 

 consists of low-lying meadows by the sea, 

 which have at some period become inundated 

 by the sea, have become salt or brackish, 

 and have continued to be so. In addition to 



periodical reflooding, there is a certain amount 

 of creep of salt water through the sand or 

 shingle. This makes the marshes salt. 



Amongst the true salt-marsh plants may be 

 found a large number of ordinary meadow 

 types. But sometimes these are driven out by 

 the salt-marsh plants entirelv. Here one may 

 find that one salt-marsh plant occurs to the 

 exclusion of all others, e.g. Buckshorn Plan- 

 tain, there Sea Aster, or again Juncus Gerardi, 

 &c. Frequent plants in the salt marsh, which 

 usually grow in extensive societies or associa- 

 tions, are Sandwort (several kinds), Sea La- 

 vender, Sea Milkwort, Sea Plantain, Shrubby 

 Sea Elite, forming small plantations 2-3 ft. 

 high and several acres in area, Samphire, 

 Sea Rush, Sea Club Rush, usually in water, 

 in drains, &c. 



Others not described in detail here are Marsh 

 Mallow, Dittander, Sea Heath, Seaside Clover, 

 Slender Hare's Ear, Hog's Fennel, Sea Aster, 

 Golden Samphire, Sea Wormwood, Marsh 

 Samphire, Sea Elite, Sea Arrow Grass, form- 

 ing large tussocks in wet submerged places, 

 Long-bracted Sedge, Perennial Beard Grass, 

 Nit Grass, &c. 



The Habitats of Coast Plants. The four 

 zones of sea-coast vegetation above referred to 

 furnish a variety of habitats, as each is dis- 

 tinct in itself. On the sandy coast there are 

 long stretches of sand where plants grow in 

 extensive patches, or discontinuously. Such a 

 coast may be diversified with rocks jutting 

 out here and there, and there may be creeks 

 and pools caused by storms which quicklv 

 become colonized by Samphire, Ruppia, &c. 

 The sand may be grass-grown, and stretch 

 inland. 



The muddy coast also furnishes a diversity 

 of habitats. As a rule, it is in the mouth of an 

 estuary. On some coasts, however, the shore 

 is eaten out of a clayey formation. 



The rocky coast is usually made up of hard 

 granitic, siliceous, sandstone, limestone, or 

 other old rocks, or of modern chalk or sand- 

 stone, or Crag, covered by Boulder Clay. The 

 influence of the soil will here determine the 

 flora which comes down to the sea-coast, and 

 is mingled with the true coastal vegetation, 

 such as Scurvy Grass, Thrift, Sea Lavender. 

 Here and there on such rocky coasts trees and 

 shrubs may shelter the vegetation, and give it 

 an extraordinary luxuriance where the climate 

 is warm and moist, as in the south-west. 



The shingle beach affords a uniform type 

 of habitat suited only to a few types. The 

 dunes also exhibit a uniform vegetation made 

 up of a few special types, the sandy and 

 saline soil suiting a minority. But in both of 

 the last cases there are frequently many weeds 



