62 PROCEEDINGS: BOSTON SOCIETY NATURAL HISTORY. 



A. hiemalis (Walt.) B. S. P., var. geminata (Trin.) Hitchc. 

 A common plant, sprawling on the sand in the wet or the dry dune 

 hollows. A. S. Hitchcock in his monograph of the North American 

 Species of Agrostis, Bull. Bur. Plant Industry, Ixviii. 43 (1905), 

 cites one sheet with awnless spikelets, but this phase is apparently 

 common. H. St. John, nos. 1,136 and 1,365 (H). 



FL, Fr August. 



Ammophila breviligulata Fernald. (A. arenaria of Am. authors, 

 not Link.) Abundant on all the drier parts of the island. Without 

 doubt this is .the most important plant on the island, for without it 

 nothing would stay the erosive action of the wind, the storms, and 

 the sea, and in a very short time the whole island would be reduced 

 to a treacherous submerged bar, such as now extend out from either 

 end of the island for more than fifteen miles. The Beach Grass does 

 what none of the hundred odd species planted for this purpose suc- 

 ceeded in doing, for in most parts of the island it actually does anchor 

 the sand and prevent the dunes from being dissipated by the winds. 

 Even the earlier explorers such as Des Barres, mention "a great 

 plenty of beach grass" (Atlantic Neptune, i. 68, 1777); in 1801, 

 Seth Coleman found the soil of Sable Island, " of a nature to produce 

 Beach Grass " (Rept. on Canadian Archives, 91, 1895). John Ma- 

 coun (M. p. 215A): "All the sandhills are covered with sandgrass 

 (Ammophila) and the wonderful vigour of this grass is well shown 

 everywhere, but more particularly where the sand has just been 

 deposited, or is in a raw state. I found one underground stem or 

 stolon over twelve feet long which had sixty-four series of roots and 

 no less than forty-seven tufts of leaves. The growing point was so 

 hard and sharp that it might almost penetrate wood." 



Another equally important use of the Beach Grass is that of pro- 

 viding the fodder that supports the gangs of wild and semi-domesti- 

 cated ponies, as well as the cattle. To one familiar with it in other 

 places the Beach Grass would seem like very poor fodder. On the 

 sheltered slopes of many of the dunes, it grows here shoulder high, 

 deep green, and juicy and succulent, so much so that I used to pull 

 young shoots and chew them as I plodded over the soft sand and 

 forced my way through the tangle of Beach Pea. It seemed to me 

 that two factors might jointly or singly explain the unusually tender 

 and succulent condition of the Beach Grass here: the cool, very moist 

 climate; the regular cutting and harvesting of it as a hay crop over 



