10 INDIAN FOREST MEMOIRS. 



Mesophilous. — Good examples of such formations are " meadows " and beech, oak 

 and birch forest of temperate climates. Warming also includes in this group 

 the deciduous ( = monsoon forest) and evergreen forests of India but a more 

 detailed knowledge of these formations would probably modify this arrange- 

 ment. 



The Indian Forester will at once recognise the very close relationship exist- 

 ing between desert and the formations of such trees as Sterculia urens and 

 BoswelUa serrata which nevertheless come under the head of deciduous 

 forests, while on the other hand some species of the evergreen forests such as 

 Carallia integerrima, Cyclostemon assamicus and Calamus tenuis occur in 

 swamps in the deciduous sal forests, and thus form a connecting link be- 

 tween the mesophilous and hydrophilous formations. 



Such terms as marsh, desert and scrub need no definition but the terms steppe and savan- 

 nah are of value in the description of our Indian forest grasslands and they have been 

 defined as follows : — 

 Definition of Steppe. — Is a " Treeless plain clothed with grasses and other perennial herbs."* * 



Steppe and tt r . ° - r 



Savannah. " The vegetation is xerophilous m character, and does not form a dense, close 



carpet. Both these features serve to distinguish grass-steppe from the allied 

 formation, meadow, whose close vegetation consists of fresh-green, soft-leaved, 

 and broad-leaved grasses and other perennial herbs. On the other hand, 

 vegetation clothing grass-steppe is closer and taller than that of desert." 1 



The importance of steppes to the Forester lies largely in the fact that they 

 are usually considered to be an indication of conditions unsuitable for tree 

 growth which is naturally of great importance as regards the question of 

 afforestation. 

 Savannah. — Schimper defines this as " xerophilous grassland containing isolated 

 trees," 2 and Warming notes that it differs from steppe " essentially in the 

 larger dimensions of the constituent plants, and above all, in the presence of 

 trees."' 6 As an excellent example of a savannah we may take the Munj 

 Grass (Saccharum Munja) formation which occupies enormous areas in 

 Northern India. 



It is very doubtful whether all savannahs can be classed as xerophilous. 

 Erianthus Ravennoe, for instance, forms typical savannahs in Northern India 

 and this species cannot be classed as xerophilous. With the exception of 

 Bamboo formation, indeed, savannah probably represents the highest type of 

 grassland and shows grasses growing under the most favourable conditions 

 of soil and moisture and thus usually indicates a condition of these factors 

 which is suitable for good forest growth. 



1 Warming, I.e., p. 281. 



2 Plant-Geography, 1903, p. 162. 



3 I.e., p. 293. 



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