Halliday, W. E. D. (1937) A Forest Classification for Canada. Canada Department of Mines and Resources (Lands, Parks and Forests Branch), Forest Service — Bulletin 89. 50 pp.

W. E. D. Hal/iday was the first person (apart from Stilgenbauer’s 7929 study) to include the forests of Prince Edward Island in a modern scientific study — even if a very broad study covering the forests of the whole of Canada. On the basis of tree species make-up, and using the concept of ’forest-formation’ developed by the American ecologist F. E. Clements, he classified the forests of the whole country into eight different forest-types (or ’Forest Regions’l. One of these types, to which — fol/owing Fernow ( 7912) — he applied the name ’Acadian’ Forest Region, comprised all the forests of the Maritime provinces except for the north—west edge of New Brunswick (see Figure 2). (By contrast, Clements had considered the forests of the Mar/times to be part of the northern boreal forest.) Hall/day subdivided his Acadian forest into seven ’Forest Sections’, and he placed all of Prince Edward Island in the Central Section, which also included most of southern and western New Brunswick and northern mainland Nova Scotia. The significance of Hal/iday's work to island studies is that he was the first person to place the island ’s forests in a continental context; the concomitant drawback is that such a large-scale approach precluded any consideration of the internal variation in the island ’3 forests. In fact it is unlikely that Hall/day ever inspected the island’s forests himself, relying instead on a few published accounts (especial/y Macoun’sl, and the general geographical context.

REFERENCES: Fernow, B. E. (1912) Forest resources and problems of Canada. Proc. Soc. Amer. Foresters, 7: 133-44. Weaver, J. E. & Clements, F. E. (1929) Plant Ecology. New York.

THE ACADIAN FOREST REGION

Geographical South of the gulf of St. Lawrence, Canada extends out into the Atlantic ocean in

MGM/0’7- a series of irregular peninsulas and islands. Of these, Prince Edward Island and the greater part of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are occupied by the Acadian Forest Region, which extends southwestward along the Appalachian System into the United States to occupy increasingly higher altitudes.

Relationship to The Forest is related to the Great Lakes - St. Lawrence Forest, the dominant other forest. conifers of which - hemlock, white pine, and red pine — are well distributed; to types. the Deciduous Forest, in possessing the so—called northern hardwoods — sugar

maple, yellow birch, and beech (which also occur within the former forest) — and The characteristic to the Boreal Forest through the presence of white spruce and balsam fir. The SPEC/es" red characteristic dominant is, however, the red spruce, which is confined to this Spruce region and extends throughout it.

Relationship to All the area of Canada considered under this Forest Region is included by Clements the 130,93, forest [i.e. Weaver & Clements 7929] as part of the Boreal Forest. This does not seem in keeping with the distribution of vegetation and the climatic conditions. John Macoun [7894], an outstanding Canadian botanist, after examination of Prince Edward Island and part of Cape Breton Island, states definitely that there is no boreal character to the vegetation. This is substantiated by the later work of Dr. Fernow [7.972] in Nova Scotia. Furthermore, several more of the associated Deciduous Forest species of the Great Lakes - St. Lawrence Forest, such as elm, butternut, white ash, silver and red maples, and red oak, are found within the region, and wire birch is more or less confined to it and adjacent portions of the

Forest. Post—glacial It is evident that during glacial times the original forests suffered a fate similar to origin. that of the forests of the Great Lakes — St. Lawrence Forest Region, being forced

against the Deciduous Forest Region along the higher levels of the Appalachians and in large part destroyed by a following Boreal invasion. Clements [i.e. Weaver

12