SEED PLANTS OF UPPER LITTORAL BELT 89 
Spergularia marina is a fleshy annual occurring in this upper littoral belt, 
which has been found during most summers in a half a dozen locations on the 
Marsh, in two areas on the eastern shore, and in two or three areas on the west 
side (plate x11). It has not been recorded from the Spit. The areas mentioned 
on the east side are on the well-drained top of the old stone wharf (950 north at 
? to 7.5 feet) where scores of plants were found in 1912, and a stretch of beach 
between 300 and 470 north, along the whole of which only 40 or 50 plants were 
found, some of them near fresh-water rivulets, but not where the soil could be 
really saturated with fresh water. The four areas at which Sperqularia has been 
found on the western shore are 1,020 north at 7 to 7.5 feet, 1,210 north at 7.75 
feet, 1,400 north at 7 feet, and 2,090 north at 8 feet. ‘Two of these are in the 
neighborhood of fresh-water streamlets, though not where the soil can be satu- 
rated with the water from them. It is possible that these streamlets favor the 
Spergularia only as they allow better drainage of the soil on which it grows by 
cutting channels through this peat clear down to the underlying gravel. The 
second and fourth areas cited for the west side are far larger and more densely 
covered. There are 10 sq. meters dominated by Spergularia at 2,090 north. On 
the Marsh, the highest plant, a single one, was near the 8.75-foot level (298 south 
by 1,075 east). More commonly it was found between the 6.5 and 8 foot levels. 
It occurs in dozens near 90 south by 1,080 east, and also by the edge of the 
tide-stream near 100 south by 1,150 east at 6.5 to 7 feet. Still more numerous 
plants were found on mud covered chiefly by mats of alge, and with but a few 
other scattered seed plants, e. g., 10 plants nearly covered a spot 2 meters 
across at 20 north by 780 east in 1912. Several square meters of soil beneath a 
bath-house at 20 south by 740 east were thickly carpeted with Spergularta in 
1912. The most surprising habitat on which a group grew was an undermined 
block of marsh turf, 1 meter broad and 2 long, that had fallen from the east bank 
of the Creek, at 150 south by 790 east. This block had probably fallen off 6 
months before our observations began, and the plants on it continued to grow 
well all summer. On the surface of this turf there grew not only the Spartina 
patens, which had held sway over it when in place on the Marsh, but Atriplez, 
Salicornia, and several other seed plants, among them Spergularia. While our 
observations are not complete enough to establish this conclusion, it is suspected 
that the bettter drainage, from the exposure of five surfaces of this block, 
instead of one surface, as when it was in situ in the Marsh, made it possible for 
the plants on it to persist there. At the middle level of this block (4 feet) these 
plants were exposed only 6 hours per tide instead of for 9.5 hours, which was 
its exposure when the block was in situ on the Marsh at 6.5 feet. On the other 
hand, the time of submergence was doubled, being increased from 3 hours at 6.5 
feet to over 6 hours at 4 feet. 
Triglochin maritima has been found in the upper littoral belt only on the 
Marsh and the adjoining portion of the eastern shore of the harbor south of the 
mill (plate x111). It is a small perennial having the habit of Plantago mari- 
tima, being rather thinly sprinkled—a dozen or two plants—among the Spartina 
patens (160 south by 1,075 east and 0 north by 740 east). In other places it is 
scattered among Solidago sempervirens (350 north by 1,000 east), or on gravelly 
beaches free of Spartina glabra (400 to 450 north by 1,060 east). T'riglochin 
grows on rather poorly drained muck-like soils, out of reach of fresh water, 
between the 6 and 7% foot tide-levels, with the exception of one colony on the 
Marsh that is growing above the 8-foot level. 
