PTARMIGANBERRY 



Arctous al-pina (Linnaeus) Niedenzu 



This dwarf shrub of the Heath Family is a colorful plant in 

 autumn when its leaves turn crimson and it is decorated with red 

 berries. Growing flat on the ground, it makes brilliant patches of 

 color under the willows, alders, and scrub pines which form open 

 thickets over the shaly flats deposited by glacial streams. By some 

 authorities the red-berried form here pictured is separated as a variety 

 from the more widespread black-berried one. Under the name Arctous 

 erythrocarpa or Arctous alpina rubra, the ptarmiganberry grows at high 

 altitudes in widely separated districts of Maine, New Hampshire, and 

 Greenland, and from British Columbia to Alaska. It occurs also in 

 Europe and Asia. 



The plant was especially beautiful in Douglas Canyon Valley, 

 which leads from Red Deer River Valley, fifty miles by trail north 

 of Lake Louise, Alberta, where we found it at an altitude of 6,000 

 feet. 



PLATE 355 



