OCR Text |
Show FROM YOUTH TO AGE. Shrubs, Herbs and Flowers Go as a Forest Grows Older. In Its youth, tho spruce forest offers an Inviting home to flowering plant, both shrubs and herbn. Tho soil Is moist and rich, consisting in largo part of decaying leaves and twigs, Tho shade, though nearly uniform, Is not dense, nnd Hecks of sunshine appear overywhoro In It. Tho light Is not strong enough to produco a tangled undergrowth, but n well-doveloped growth Is round everywhere except In the most shaded spots. Tho layer of shrub3 and bushes consists con-sists largely of tho nw'taln maplo, roso and nlnebark, amon"; which aro scattered birches, gooseberries, raspberries rasp-berries and viburnums. In spring tho ground Is carpeted with strawborrles. Along tho brooks white and yellow violets nro common, and orchids aro scattered hero and there. In tho summer sum-mer flowers aro abundant, gentians, bluebells, goldenrnds, daisies, colum-blno colum-blno and painted cup3 vying with each other in giving color to tho mnss of green. In tho shadier places, low ferns abound, while the moist soil of tho shadiest nooks Is clothed with mosses and lichens. As tho fore't grows oh" f, the shrubs aro tho first plants to d'sappear becauso be-causo of the Increasing s'tade. They aro followed after a few yars, first by the taller herbs and then tho others until only a thoso llowors that rcqulro llttlo light aro loft. Kvcn theso porslst only In morn open spots, nnd finally disappear as tho sliado becomes uniformly uni-formly dense. A mature f 01 est. 200 years old 01 more, rarely nllows even a stray san-beam san-beam to pass, nnd beneath It Is twilight twi-light at noonday. A row evergreen plrolas blossom In scattered groups. Clusters of tho coral root aro found frequently In bloom, but this Is a leafless leaf-less orchid that requires little or no light. ' Tho ground is covorcd with a dense layer of brown spruce needles, which furnish a home for toadstools and cup-fungi, cup-fungi, and In tho molsturo places, for lichens and mosses. Tho rorost has now reached Its final staRC. It miy still persist In this form for sevcal hundreds of years. Indeed, In-deed, if it is not remo I by nn accident, acci-dent, it Is dllllcult to set a limit to Its age. In any ovont. a forest can rarely llvo 1,000 years, owing to tho preat vlght of tho treo tops and tho fact that decay de-cay is constantly weakening tho trunks. St. Nicholas. |