Smith and Woodivard : Botanical Survey of Teesdale. 313 



waters of the Balder valley where Mr. Lewis has recorded an 

 extensive area of Sphagnum bog. The excursion attracted the 

 bryologists, and they rendered good service, furnishing the list 

 of mosses (see pages 265-267). Above Balder Head farm 

 there is no cultivation and the valley is narrow with steep 

 slopes on both sides, and continues thus above the junction of 

 the Balder and Black Beck. Nowhere was there any exposure 

 of the whinsill, and the steep rounded slopes are covered with 

 rough pasture, except where lateral streams descend from 

 the upper fells and cut deep V-shaped valleys, with shaley 

 sides so steep that there is little or no roothold for plants. 

 The landscape is therefore different from Teesdale, where 

 the river winds in a broad valley bottom flanked with high 

 rocky scars. The valley slopes of the Balder are mapped by 

 Lewis as Grass Heath, but it is a very wet type, and consists 

 quite as much of sedges and rushes as of grasses. Ling, dwarfed 

 Bilberry and Cotton Sedge (Eriophonim vaginatum) are present, 

 and form patches on drier soil. Everywhere, even on steeper 

 slopes, there was some Sphagnum and other mosses of wet places, 

 and underfoot was always wet. 



The surface soils, according to the geological maps, are 

 boulder clay, and weathered shales. The area mapped as 

 sphagnum bog forms a horse-shoe, curving round all the head- 

 waters of the Balder, and is continued westwards almost to 

 the watershed of the Eden valley. The part marked Schackles- 

 boro Moss was traversed westwards for about two miles, and 

 another part above the Black Beck was visited later. The 

 land is a plateau, almost flat, extending from the valley slopes 

 southwards and westwards to a prominent summit (1489) on 

 Cotherstone Moor. The east end of Shacklesboro appeared to 

 be Ling and Cotton Sedge, but a closer inspection revealed 

 much Jtmcits squarrosus, Erica tetralix and scanty bits of 

 Crowberry. Under foot there was everywhere a squelchy 

 carpet of bog-mosses and hepatics, so that the bryologists were 

 busy, and the list furnished by Mr. Ingham is an important 

 contribution. It was noteworthy that there were few signs of 

 peat erosion, and that almost every channel and pool was filled 

 with vivid green moss, or held masses of the taller Junci, while 

 the ' grips ' cut some seven years ago have become choked with 

 Sphagnum recurvum. 



In the few eroded water-courses remains of Birch were 

 found at the base of the peat, and this suggests that the m.oor 



1910 Aug. I. 



