APPENDIX 



CALIFORNIA COLLECTION. 



In the way of general considerations on the flora of our route in Cali- 

 fornia, there is but little for me to say as a preface to this mere catalogue: 

 first, because of the publication of the Botany of California. For the same 

 reason I have excluded descriptions and kept this apart from the body of my 

 report. American botanists have reason to congratulate the authors and 

 themselves on the probable early completion of that great work. Second, 

 because, upon the essential facts of the history of botany there, Prof. D. 

 C. Eaton has dwelt in the preface to his article on the Ferns of the South- 

 west, which forms a most valuable addition to this volume ; and, third, 

 because the important facts, so far as observed by us, have been already 

 published in the Rej>ort of this Survey for 1876. 



There are, however, a few facts to which it might be well to allude: 

 and the first one is the marked change which occurs in the character of the 

 arborescent vegetation as we go north from Walker's Basin along the Kern 

 River Valley and up the South Fork of that stream. After passing Havi- 

 lah (a few miles north of Walker's Basin), no oak trees were seen along our 

 route to the base of Fisherman's Peak, until, on the return trip, we reached 

 the Soda Spring on the North Fork of Kern River. Here they again 

 appeared, and as we moved south toward Deer Creek and Linn's Valley 

 they became common, until in the last-named region they were more abun- 

 dant in the lower grounds than the coniferous vegetation, which had hitherto 

 given exclusive character to the landscape. 



It was further worthy of note that no Sequoia gigantea was seen on 

 the eastern side of the North Fork of Kern River or anywhere on the 

 South Fork, though situations were frequently noted at which, so far as 

 the ordinary physical conditions of soil, exposure, etc., w r ere concerned, 

 it might have been expected, especially so as it is now well known to be 

 common on the western slope of valleys drained bv the headwaters of 



23 EOT 333 



