52 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 
The small specimen found at the 972-foot level was in an upright 
position and rested upon a black shale layer, about an inch thick, 
which disappeared entirely a few feet from the stump. The pres- 
ence of the black shale layer, in the vicinity of the stump would 
seem to indicate that it was found in the place of its growth; yet it 
is possible that it may have drifted in and been buried in the upright 
position in which it was found. At the middle horizon (the old 
locality) a stump was found 6 feet above the shale layer on which 
the other stumps that were found rested; but the specimen in this 
case did not rest upon a shale layer. The present Catskill mountains 
during this Upper Devonian period constituted the low shore of a 
shallow sea, the continental land lying off to the east. The coasts of 
those times were unstable, and it was along the borders of such a 
coast line that at least three successive forests of these trees reared 
themselves to great heights, were submerged, destroyed and buried. 
With the recent additions to our collection, which we owe to the 
courtesy of the Commissioners of the New York Board of Water 
Supply and of Mr J. Waldo Smith, chief engineer, we now have a 
total of 40 stumps partial or complete, and a number of broken 
pieces. Taking into connection with these the specimens which have 
gone to other museums, the weathered stumps discarded, and those 
destroyed in blasting, the number of stumps taken from these pri- 
meval forests probably runs into the hundreds; and further quarry- 
ing is continually bringing more to light. The Riverside quarry will 
not be included in the area covered by the Gilboa dam, but its value 
as a fossil tree locality will be greatly lessened as soon as the quarry- 
ing operations in connection with the dam cease. Now that the rock 
layers containing the stumps have been located it is quite possible 
that they can be traced around the hills and found outcropping else- 
where. In the area known, the tree localities have been found 
stretching over a distance of something more than 124 miles.* 
As stated above, these ancient trees were described by Dawson as 
fern trees belonging to the genus Psaronius and represented 
by two species erianus and textilis.® In the report of the 
Geological Survey of Canada, 1871, P. tex tilis is noted as occur- 
ring at Gilboa and P. erianus in Madison county. In the 24th 
Report of the State Museum both are described as having been 
* Notices of these recent occurrences have been mentioned in the later reports 
of the Director of the Museum, and an illustrated article entitled “ The Oldest 
of the Forests” by John M,. Clarke was published in the Scientific Monthly, 
January, 1921, pp. 83-01. 
5Geol. Surv. Canada, 1871, p. 58, 50; Quart. Jour. Geol. Soc., 1871, 
27:269; 1882, 37:307. 
