Star-flowered Solomon's Seal, Vagnera 



stellata (L.) Morong, on Eastern 



Long Island, N. Y. 



Roy Lath.vm 



A note in Torreya, July-Aug., 1929, by Mr. Raymond H. 

 Torrey, published a record for this species growing in sand dunes 

 in Sunken Meadow, Long Island and considered it a rare occur- 

 rence in his experience. 



I would record here that the species is quite general and 

 common to abundant on eastern Long Island, occurring on both 

 forks. I have always considered and recorded the plant one of 

 the common species in the flora of the Southold township. Dune 

 and beach sands are its common habitat in this region and it 

 frequently straggles out into sandy brackish swamps. In 

 Orient where the species is certainly abundant it is more general 

 in distribution than elsewhere on the north shore. In Orient 

 on the beach sands between Gardiner's and Long Beach Bays 

 the plant grows in large thrifty beds associated with the red 

 cedar, Juniperns virginiana; beach plum, Prunus maritima; 

 bayberry, Myrica carolinensis ; pitch pine, Pinus rigida; post 

 oak, Quercus stellata; sea lovage, Lignsticum scothicum; sea- 

 side golden-rod Solidage sempervirens and many other plants 

 in the flora common of the sea coast. This locality is occasionally 

 washed by flood tides, but very rarely during the growing sea- 

 son. 



On the mainland in Orient we find the plant in various situa- 

 tions, but most frequently in dry woodlands. One tract of dry 

 soil covered with a heavy growth of red cedars, which has been 

 cleared since the World War, contained a covering of this Solo- 

 son 's-seal. The large plants were knee-high and extended over 

 an area of two and one-half acres. The soil is a rich, dry loam — 

 known as the famous Orient potato soil, but extremely acid 

 before being limed. 



At Southold and Peconic we find the species in the dune 

 sand, often high and dry, dwarf of growth and struggling to 

 keep above the shifting sands. 



We record the species in Mattituck, Riverhead, Calverton 

 and on the Islands of Shelter and Gardiner's. 



On the south shore we record the species from Montauk. 



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