NATURALIST'S GUIDE TO THE AMERICAS 



and others, and numerous herbs, grasses, 

 and sedges. Potentilla, Draba, Pyrola, 

 Arnica, Pedicularis, Campanula, Anten- 

 naria, Festuca, Poa, Carex, and nu- 

 merous others belong in this group. 



In the moister, damper places a moor- 

 vegetation frequently establishes itself, 

 with wet-soil grasses, sedges, cotton- 

 grasses, and rushes, forming hummocky 

 turf with mosses, and liverworts grow- 

 ing all over the soil between. Here 

 grow Montia, several species of Ranun- 

 culus, Oxyria, Tofieldia, Licopodium, 

 Equisetum, and others. 



Though almost no high trees or heavy 

 growth of shrubbery are found, the land 

 seems rich in plant growth during the 

 short summer, and wherever a plant can 

 establish itself on cliff or slope or rocky 

 ledge, one is usually found. 



The plant life of the sea is well de- 

 veloped, and Laminaria, Agarum, Ala- 

 ria, and others form a rather rich sea- 

 growth wherever conditions permit. 

 The cold seas with their high content of 

 gases support an incredibly rich plank- 

 ton life, so dense at times during the 

 continuous summer sunshine as to color 

 the water. It is from this abundant 

 plankton life that the multitudinous 

 bird and animal life of the Greenland 

 seas derive their ultimate sustenance. 



Animal life 



Three thousand species of animal life 

 have been reported from Greenland and 

 its adjacent waters of which all except a 

 very few are lower forms. Of the higher 

 forms 30 are mammals; 150 are birds, 

 and 100 are fish.- 



The land mammals are the muskox, 

 " confined to the northern and north- 

 eastern coasts; the caribou, which, 

 though once distributed throughout the 

 coastal lands, is. now rather limited to 

 certain favorable stretches of coast; 

 the arctic hare, common along the 

 entire coast; the lemming, occupying 

 approximately the same range as the 

 muskox; these 4 are herbivores, feeding 

 upon the low, hard vegetation. The 

 carnivores are 3 in number- the arctic 

 wolf, now almost extinct except in the 



northernmost tracts; the polar fox, both 

 white and blue phases, rather common 

 among the whole coast, particularly 

 where the seabirds nest most numer- 

 rously; and the ermine, restricted to the 

 range of the lemming, upon which it 

 feeds. 



The polar bear, frequenting the whole 

 coast, may be classed as both land- 

 animal and sea-animal, since he is 

 equally at home on both, and may bear 

 his young either on land, or in snow- 

 drift burrows beside the grounded bergs. 

 He is generally carnivorous, feeding 

 chiefly upon the seals that he catches 

 on the ice or in the sea, but he may, in 

 times of hunger, feed upon berries 

 where they are available. 



The land-birds nesting in Greenland 

 are Reinhardt's ptarmigan, common on 

 every hillside; the Lapland longspur, 

 frequenting the willow and alder copses; 

 the snow-bunting, ubiquitous as to 

 habitat; the Greenland wheat-ear, at 

 home on the drier, rockier, sunnier 

 hillsides; the American pipit; the red- 

 polls (Acanthis hornemanni hornemanni 

 and Acanthis linaria rostrata) ; the snowy 

 owl, most common about the haunts of 

 the lemming; the raven, the gyrfalcon, 

 and the peregrine falcon, frequenting 

 the bird-cliffs and the coastal heights. 

 The ptarmigan, the owl, the raven, may 

 and often do, remain all year, even in 

 the northernmost parts of Greenland, 

 even through the long, dark night. 



The gray sea-eagle nests along the 

 coast; like the polar bear, he frequents 

 both land and sea, and though preying 

 largely on the inland salmon, often 

 captures young seals and sea-birds. 



No reptiles are found. Only two 

 freshwater fish are common Salmo al- 

 pinus L., and Gasterosteus aculeatus L. 



Insects are not numerous, considered 

 as a group. Four hundred species are 

 known, of which many have been .in- 

 troduced. Coleoptera are represented 

 by about 40 species; Hymenoptera, by 

 about 70 species, including two bumble- 

 bees; Lepidoptera, by 50 species, mostly 

 moths; and the Diptera by about 200 

 species. Mosquitoes are numerous and 



