6 REPORT ON THE BOTANY OF 
exceedingly rapid return of the forests be explained. It has 
not yet been possible to adopt the statistical plan of studying 
our western forests shown in the report on the forests of 
Greenup county, &c. When this is done, it will be seen that 
the new or second-growth forests on the “barrens” is not 
nearly as diversified as the other and older forests; there being 
far more variety in the trees of the old than there is in the 
new forests. 
Assistant John R. Proctor, of the Kentucky Survey, has 
made some important observations as to the Western forests 
of the old “barrens,” going to show that the conglomerate or 
beds just below the coal form a natural limit to this once. tree- 
less area on the west. The detail of these observations will 
properly find a place in the proposed memoirs on the distri- 
bution of the forest trees of Kentucky. 
N. S: SHALER, 
32 
