Trees of New York State 395 



We construct a general platean of say 2.000 feet elevation to 

 5,350 feet in the Adirondacks. Next Ave dissect this plateau down 

 to the aspect of a hill and mountain land, cutting well defined 

 stream ways which converge to form the Delaware, Susquehanna 

 and Alleghany drainage systems cutting into the plateau from 

 the south. The Hudson-Champlain valley is a dissection to near 

 sea level, cutting the State across from south to north. At the 

 northwest we should plane down to fit the Ontario Lake basin, 

 thus constructing the low, level plain bordering that lake and 

 extending eastward as the Iriquois basin, including the Oneida 

 Lake basin. The Mohawk is, then, a low and mostly broad valley 

 a few hundred feet above sea level and joining the lake basin 

 country with the Hudson valley. This cut severs the southern or 

 Alleghany plateau from the Adirondacks. The lake basin country 

 is continued around the north of the Adirondacks as a broad, 

 low plain, the St. Lawrence valley. From the Iroquois-Ontario 

 basin, cuts will be made into the Alleghany plateau constructing 

 the Genesee drainage and the Finger Lake region of narrow north- 

 south valleys opening out upon the lake basin plain. Finally, 

 dissection of the Adirondack plateau would include sharply defined 

 channels such as the Black, Oswegatchie, Raquett, Saranac, 

 Ausable and Upper Hudson rivers and other masked or poorly 

 established drainage features which maj^ represent the effects of 

 glacial filling. 



"The extremes of climatic conditions as thus created, added to 

 latitude and ocean influence factors, may be expressed by a contrast 

 between Stat en Island and the summit of Mount Marcy. 

 Unfortunately, actual figures are not available for Mount Marcy, 

 but so far as growing season is concerned, where absence of frost 

 is taken as a criterion, the summit of Marcy would scarcely have 

 any growing period at all for warm climate plants which reach 

 their northern limit at the mouth of the Hudson, for it is doubtful 

 if any month is wholly free from frost. Certainly the growing 

 season for even the cold-resisting artic flora of the summit can 

 scarcely exceed three months, while around New York bay the 

 f rostless period covers 200 days. But this doesn 't express the full 

 force of the difference between these two extremes. One should 

 know the daily range of temperature in summer, which, of course, 

 for the mountain summit, would be extreme. Again the lowest 

 winter temperatures, the duration of zero or below zero tempera- 

 ture and so on. 



