[Reprinted from Torreya, Vol. 14, No. 11, Nov., 1914.] 



THE FLORA OF THE TOWN OF SOUTHOLD, LONG 

 ISLAND AND GARDINER'S ISLAND 



By Stewart H. Btjrnham and Roy A. Latham 



The town of Southold is at the eastern end of the north shore 

 of Long Island, extending westward for twenty miles through 

 the villages of Orient, East Marion, Greenport, Southold, 

 Peconic, Cutchogue to Mattituck and Laurel. The topography 

 of the town affords a pleasing variation. On the north, paralleled 

 with the coast of Long Island Sound, are rolling plains and 

 hillocks; now forested, now barren, or broken by low-lying necks 

 of sandy beaches and inlets. On the south, facing the bays and 

 harbors, are extensive salt meadows drained by numerous tidal 

 creeks: the marshes bordered, here and there, by a growth of 

 cedar and hardwood. Between the waterways and tidal creeks 

 sandy beaches extend far out: such areas often being covered 

 with sprawling red cedars, pitch pine and beach plum shrubs. 

 On one of these peninsulas at Orient over seventy-five species 

 of lichens have been found, growing either on the low trees or 

 on the ground: and on a single prostrate cedar fourteen species 

 were found. Fertile, low, level farms lie principally through the 

 center of the town of Southold. Among the more common 

 plants found throughout the town but not known to occur at 

 Orient, are: Skunk-cabbage, beech, witch-hazel, trailing arbutus 

 and mountain laurel. These plants are found at Greenport, six 

 miles west of Orient: and the local flora of these two places 

 seem strangely different. 



Gardiner's Island is situated ten miles southeast of Orient and 

 three miles north of the Hampton shore. The flora is quite 

 similar to that found about Orient; excepting the abundance of 



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