54 STOCK RANGES OF NORTHWESTERN CALIFORNIA. 



Coast-bluff species: Pinus contorta, P. muricata, Calamagrostis 

 aleutica, Phalaris co&rtdescens, Sisyrinchium calif ornicum, Lotus 

 formosissimus, Gentiana oregana. 



Boreal plants: Cornus canadensis, Arctostaphylos ura-ursi, Juncus 

 supiniformis, Hypericum anagalloides, Poterium officinale, Drosera 

 rotund if ol ia, Lomaria spicant, Ledum glandulosum, Sphagnum men- 

 docinum, S. cy mbifolium, S. subsecundum longifolium, Car ex valli- 

 cola, C. salina mutica, C.livida (reported from "peat bogs and pine 

 barrens from New Jersey and New York to Labrador and Lake 

 Superior and high northward Alaska"). 



Species apparently endemic: Veratrum fimbriatum, Lilium mari- 

 timum, Campanula linneeifolia, Carex pJiyMomaniaca, C. mendoci- 

 nensis, C. gynodynamia, Agrostis pringlei, Calamagrostis bolanderi, 

 C. crassiglumis. 



Attempts to cultivate the white-ash prairie lands have been made 

 with great labor and little result. Oats, potatoes, beans, peas, corn, 

 and cabbages will grow fairty in the best spots, and velvet-grass 

 (Holcus Janatus), a little ray grass, and squirrel-tail seem to thrive; 

 orchard grass is said to grow but poorly. Tall oat grass would proba- 

 bly thrive as well as the velvet grass and make a more valuable crop. 

 Taken all in all the conditions are very unpromising for the produc- 

 tion of agricultural crops, and it is doubtful whether the land would 

 ever pay for the cost of clearing and breaking. Danish settlers claim, 

 however, that it would make good farm land if laid down to some 

 pasture grass, grazed first with horses, second with cows, third with 

 sheep, and finally plowed and treated with all the stable manure 

 available. The writer could not find that any one of them had tried 

 to put this precept into practice, however, and it is at best highly 

 doubtful Avhether any good pasture grass could be induced to grow 

 there. 



The native vegetation of the white-ash prairies furnishes almost as 

 clear an indication of the plrrsical and chemical nature of the soil as 

 do the alkali weeds in the Great Valle} 7 Region and the Colorado 

 Desert. The poor soils are invariably indicated by the low stature 

 of such shrubs and trees as grow more luxuriantly on adjacent areas 

 of good soil, particularly salal, chinquapin, cypress, XerophyUum, 

 and bracken, and the presence of labrador tea, Lomaria, and Arctos- 

 tapliylos nummular ia, • 



BOTTOM LANDS. 



Alluvial lands are not commonly met with in northwestern Cali- 

 fornia on account of the mountainous nature of the country. The 

 principal alluvial areas in the coast section are the bottom lands of 

 Eel River, with its broad flood plain, the flood plain which fringes 

 Humboldt Bay, and the bottom lands of Smith River. A small culti- 

 vated area of bottom land occurs at the mouth of the Garcia River. 



