TORREYA 



Vol. II 



November, igii 



No. II 



THE RIVER-BANK VEGETATION OF THE LOWER 



APALACHICOLA, AND A NEW PRINCIPLE librar 



ILLUSTRATED THEREBY ^^^ YO» 



BOTANIC- 



By Roland M. Harper (|AKDE^ 



Every river is unique in some respects, and the Apalachicola, 

 which is formed by the union of the Flint and Chattahoochee 

 at the southwestern corner of Georgia, and flows in a general 

 southerly direction to the Gulf, dividing West Florida from 

 Middle Florida, seems to be more so than many others of similar 

 size. Only one other river, the Alabama, carries water from the 

 Piedmont region to the Gulf of Mexico, and the Apalachicola 

 differs from that in several ways. In the first place, it has no 

 connection with the Paleozoic region or the Cretaceous "prairie" 

 region, and is therefore presumably less calcareous. Second, it 

 flows through a very low and flat country* for the last sixty 

 miles or so of its course, while the Alabama has rolling hills close 

 to it all the way to its mouthf (and even beyond, for there are 

 bluffs nearly lOO feet high on Mobile Bay). 



Botanically also the Apalachicola presents many interesting 

 features. On its eastern bank between the Georgia line and 

 Bristol there are several high bluffs, which have been celebrated 

 among botanists for three quarters of a century on account of 

 being the home of two gymnospermous trees not known anywhere 



* Described as the "Middle Florida flatwoods" in Ann. Rep. Fla. Geol. Surv. 

 3: 221-222. 1911. 



t The railroad which crosses the estuarine swamps of the Apalachicola a few miles 

 from its mouth, where they are five miles wide, goes on trestles all the way, pre- 

 sumably because the nearest hills from which earth could be obtained on a level 

 with the cars are over 40 miles away; while the one which is similarly situated with 

 respect to the Alabama River system crosses 15 miles of swamp, on earth embank- 

 ments. 

 [No. 10, Vol.. II, of ToKRBYji, comprising pp. 205-224, was issuf'd 18 October 191 j 1 



225 



