150 



Kalm in America and by Osbeck in China, and he must ever 

 plead guilty to the charge of needlessly changing names already 

 given by his predecessors. 



A NOTE ON THE "FLOWERING" OF THE LAKES 

 IN THE ADIRONDACKS 



By Marshall A. Howe 



In the spring of 1902, Mrs. Annie Morrill Smith, of Brooklyn, 

 sent me for determination a small alga, which in the very full 

 notes accompanying the communication, she stated to be chiefly 

 responsible for the phenomenon known to the guides of the 

 Adirondack region as the "flowering" or "blossoming" of the 

 lakes. A portion of Mrs. Smith's letter runs as follows : 



" I spent the summers of 1891, 1892, and 1893 at Honnedaga 

 Lake, Herkimer County, N. Y., on the Adirondack League Club 

 Tract. The altitude is about 2,200 feet, or possibly 2,400 feet. 

 On the 14th of August of each year we noticed for the first 

 time the water of the lake filled with golden globules so plenty 

 that a glass slowly lowered and withdrawn was clouded. Micro- 

 scopic examination at the time convinced me (though without 

 books of reference) that it was an alga. It continued plenty as 

 long as we were at Honnedaga, about September 1st each year, 

 how much longer I could not say. At Little Moose Lake, at 

 the northern end of the Club Tract, I made inquiry as to the 

 appearance of the alga, which I may say the guides on all the 

 Club Tract call ' the flowering or blossoming of the lake,' and 

 they all assured me it was never to be seen in Little Moose Lake, 

 though all knew it in Honnedaga and other of the lakes of the 

 tract. While at Chilson Lake [Essex County] in 1901, I asked 

 Mrs. Harris if she had ever noticed such a phenomenon and 

 found that they had seen something of the kind but attributed 

 it to the fall on the lake-surface of the pollen of trees or other 

 plants. This is entirely different, as this last rises to the surface 

 while the alga is more plenty below the surface and never rises 



