70 ; The Vegetation of the Sea-coast. 
acaulis, its tiny leaf-rosettes "half-buried, their blades flattened to the sand, 
often forms small colonies. Calvstegia soldanella makes green patches, or 
isolated plants may be dotted about, as may the grasses Festuca littoralis 
and Calamagrostis Billardieri and the stiff-stemmed tussocks of Scirpus 
nodosus. Salsola kali is fairly common in some places. The pale-green, 
"succulent Arripler Billardieri occurs sparingly throughout, and forms mats ; 
upon the sand. It is abundant on certain beaches in Stewart Island, where it 
forms a girdle on the upper shore 2 m wide, the stems half-buried and 
the plants some go .cm apart. In the N. the grass Zoysia pungens is fairly 
ee Be 3 | $ 
6. San ‚shore. 
ET shores vary greatly in their physical characteristics, for Akira are 
many gradations from sandy-gravel to rocks worn flat, or where there is an 
_ uneven stony surface with large rocks standing out and affording shelter. 
The florula of stony shores is much richer than that of sandy; the 
 firmer substratum, the moisture beneath the stones, in the case of shingle or 
' gravel, and the greater degree of shelter, all favour growth-forms ‘and meet 
‚ Physiological requirements to which sandy shores are hostile. With but few 
ceptions, the species belong to other formations, salt-meadow, rock, heath, ; 
_ forest‘ and river-bed all eg Beanes iur, actual m. Be terraces 
DB are ‚here Sa win, ke 
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