PREFACE. 



To the member* of the Asa Gray Botanical Club : 



The following list of plants was compiled when the club was first organ- 

 ized, and is now published at your solicitation. It was intended as a guide 

 to the phsenogamous and vascular cryptogamous plants found growing spon- 

 taneously within a radius of seven miles of Utica during the spring months. 



Only those who have been engaged on a similar task can form a just esti- 

 mate of the labor incident to its preparation. 



It is a difficult matter to draw a line between the early or spring flowers, 

 and the later or summer blooming ones, for the season which presents the 

 greatest variation in the time of flowering is the spring. 1 cannot here 

 enter into a lengthy statement of how widely the seasons may differ, but 

 will offer in illustration of this, for purposes of comparison, a list of dates 

 when our earliest spring flower, i. e., Hepatiea, was first observed in bloom 

 during a period of seventeen years. [See list A.] 



The list therefore includes the plants detected in flower from the opening 

 of the season to about the second week in June. The flowering time of 

 most species has been as definitely stated as possible, and also the maturing 

 of fruit, when deemed necessary. 



The region covered by this list lies between Sterling Creek on the east, 

 Oriskany Creek on the west, and from the summit of the Deerfield Hills on 

 the north, to the sphagnum pond on Frankfort Hill, generally known as 

 Wetmore's, on the south — thus including Utica and portions of the towns 

 of Frankfort, Schuyler, New Hartford, Wbitestown, Marcy and Deerfield. 

 Localities of rare plauts have been carefully noted, and for convenience of 

 many pursuing the study of botany, general localities have been described, 

 such as ravines, hill-sides, shady woods, swamps, meadows, pastures, rich 

 soils, etc., and to avoid repetition, unless expressly stated, plants are to be 

 understood as common in the localities mentioned. It has been my 

 aim to include such only as 1 can vouch for from personal observation, and 

 a few that have been reported as formerly growing in this region, but prob- 

 ably now extinct. 



My endeavor has been to conform as nearly as possible to the latest and 

 most natural system of classification. 



Acknowledgements are due to many botanical friends, who have rendered 

 invaluable hints through their catalogues, also to you, the members of the 

 Asa Gray Botanical Club, for assistance in preparing the list for publication. 



In conclusion, do not rely on this list for too great assistance in the analy- 

 sis of plants; it should rather serve the purpose of a diary for field notes. 

 " The best part of botany is not in the books, but it is in that boundless, out- 

 door life, whose interest, beauty and mystery is with us from the cradle to 

 the grave, forever stimulating inquiry and ever richly rewarding patient 

 and loving toil." 



JOSEPH V. HABERER. 



Utica, N. Y., May 1, 1888. President. 



