The Flora of Boston and Its Vicinity

By Asa Gray, Ll.D.,
Professor of Natural History in Harvard University.

The changes of climate which are referred to in a preceding chapter have led to corresponding changes in the vegetation. It is only by conjecture and analogy that we can form some general idea of the vegetation of Massachusetts in the days which immediately preceded the advent of the glacial period, when the ancestors of the present trees, shrubs, and herbs of New England, which had long flourished within the Arctic Circle, were beginning to move southward before the slowly advancing refrigeration. But, as the refrigeration at the north increased, a warm-temperate vegetation, which may have resembled that of the Carolinas and of Florida at present, must have been forced southward, and have been replaced very gradually by a flora very like that which we now look upon. This, in its turn, must have been wholly expelled from New England by the advancing ice-sheet, under and by which our soil has been completely remodelled. After this ice-sheet had melted and receded, and the new soil had become fit for land vegetation, — that is, at a time geologically recent, — the vegetation of Boston and its environs must have closely resembled that of northern Labrador or of Greenland, or even have consisted mainly of the same species of herbs and stunted shrubs which compose the present Arctic-alpine flora. The visitor to the summit of Mount Washington will there behold a partial representation of it, as it were an insular patch, — a vestige of the vegetation which skirted the ice in its retreat, and was stranded upon the higher mountain summits of New England, while the main body retreated northward at lower levels. In time, the arborescent vegetation, and the humbler plants which thrive in the shade of trees, or such of them as survived the vicissitudes of a southern migration, returned to New England; and our coast must have been at one time clothed with white spruces; then probably with black spruce and arbor-vita^, with here and there some canoe birches and beeches; and these, as the climate ameliorated, were replaced by white and red pines, and at length the common pitch pine came to occupy the lighter soils; and the three or four species of oak, the maples, ashes, with their various arboreal and frutescent associates, came in to complete the ordinary and well-known New England forest of historic times. ^[2]Palfrey, in his History of New England, i. 16, enumerates the characteristic trees of New England. Most are indigenous to the vicinity of Boston. All were different in species from the trees of old … Continue reading

Even without historical evidence, we should infer with confidence that New England before human occupation was wholly forest-clad, excepting a line of salt marshes on certain shores, and the bogs and swamps not yet firm enough to sustain trees. The islands in our bay were well wooded under Nature’s planting, although we now find it difficult, yet by no means impossible, to reforest them.

The Indian tribes found here by the whites had not perceptibly modified the natural vegetation; and there is no evidence that they had here been preceded by any agricultural race. Their inconsiderable plantation of maize, along with some beans and pumpkins, — originally derived from much more southern climes, but thriving under a sultry summer, — however important to the raisers, could not have sensibly affected the face of the country; although it was said that “in divers places there is much ground cleared by the Indians.” But, whatever may have been the amount of their planting, if the aborigines had simply abandoned the country, no mark of their occupation would have long remained, so far as the vegetable kingdom is concerned.

Very different was the effect of European immigration, and the occupation of the land by an agricultural, trading, and manufacturing people. Yet, with all the change, it is not certain that any species of tree, shrub, or herb has been extirpated from eastern Massachusetts, although many which must have been common have become rare and local, and their continuation precarious; and the distribution and relative proportions of the land flora, and even that of the streams, have been largely altered.

Regarded simply as to number of species, no doubt an increase in the variety has been the net result, even after leaving all cultivated and purposely introduced plants out of view. For while it is doubtful if any species has been entirely lost from the environs of Boston (taking these to include the counties of Norfolk, Middlesex, and Essex), a very considerable number has been acquired, although the gain has not always been an advantage. Some of the immigrant plants, indeed, are ornamental or useful; others are the pests of the fields and gardens, showy though several of them are; and perhaps all of them are regarded by the botanist with dislike when they mix themselves freely or predominantly with the native denizens of the soil, as if “to the manner born,” since their incoming tends to confuse the natural limits and characteristics of floras.

The influx of European weeds was prompt and rapid from the first, and has not ceased to flow; for hardly a year passes in which new comers are not noticed in some parts of the country.

The earliest notices of the plants of this vicinity which evince any botanical knowledge whatever are contained in John Josselyn’s New Englands Rarities discovered, published in 1672, ^[3]Reprinted and carefully edited, with an introduction and commentaries, very important for the botany, by Professor Edward luckei-nian. Josselyn first arrived in Boston in July, 1638, and came again … Continue reading and in his Voyages, published in 1674. The next — after a long interval — are by Manasseh Cutler, of Ipswich (Hamilton), in his ” Account of Some of the Vegetable Productions naturally growing in this part of America, botanically arranged,” published in the first volume of the Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1785. Next in order was Dr. Bigelow’s Florida Bostoniensis, issued in 1814.

More interesting to us than his account of the indigenous vegetation of the country is Josselyn’s list ” of such plants as have sprung up since the English planted and kept cattle in New England.” Twenty-one of such plants are mentioned by their popular English names, and most of them aie to be identified. And the list of ” garden herbs ” comprises several plants — among them sorrel, purslane, spearmint, ground-ivy, elecampane, and tansy — which have since become naturalized weeds. Moreover, several herbs are mentioned as indigenous both to New England and to the mother country which are certainly not of American origin, but manifest introductions from the Old World.

There is no need to specify the numerous plants of the Old World which, purposely or accidentally imported by European settlers, have been added to the flora not only of Boston, but of the Atlantic United States generally. They are conspicuous in all our manuals and catalogues, and indeed are even more familiar to people in general than are most of the indigenous plants. Yet attention may be called to those which are somewhat peculiarly denizens of Boston, — that is, which have thoroughly established themselves in this vicinity, yet have manifested a disinclination to spread beyond eastern New England. Some of them, however, occur in the seaboard districts of the Middle States.

If Jossclyn is to be trusted, various introduced plants must have taken wonderfully prompt possession of the new soil; for (as just mentioned) he enumerates St. John’s wort, catmint, toad-flax, Jerusalem oak ( Chenopodium Botrys ), and “wood-wax, wherewith they dye many pretty colors,” as indigenous to the country. But most of these could assert no such claim in much later times; and it is probable that either the memory or the judgment of Josselyn may have been at fault. However this may be, the last-mentioned plant may head the list of those introduced plants which are somewhat characteristic of the environs of Boston.

Woad-waxen, or dyer’s greenweed ( Genista tinctoria ), which covers the sterile hills between Salem and Lynn with a full glow of yellow at flowering-time, is very local at a few other stations, and is nearly or quite unknown beyond eastern New England. According to Tuckerman there is a tiadition that it was introduced here by Governor Endicott, which may have been forty years before Josselyn finished his herborizing, — enough to account for its naturalization at that period, but not enough to account for its being then regarded as indigenous.

Fall dandelion ( Leontodon autumnale ) is remarkable for its abundance around Boston, and its scarcity or total absence elsewhere.

Bulbous buttercup ( Ranunculus bulbosus ), whose deep yellow blossoms give a golden tinge to our meadows and pastures in the latter part of spring, has hardly spread beyond New England, and abounds only in eastern Massachusetts, — unlike the tall buttercup (R. acris) in this respect, which is diffused throughout the Northern and Middle States.

Succory, or chichory ( Cichorium Intybus ), which adorns our roadsides and many fields with cerulean blue at midsummer, is of rare occurrence beyond this neighborhood, and when met with out of New England shows little disposition to spread.

Jointed charlock ( Raphanus Raphanistruin ) is a conspicuous and troublesome weed only in eastern Massachusetts.

Bladder campion ( Silene inflata ), if not confined to this district, is only here abundant or conspicuous; and the list of such herbs could be considerably extended.

Barberry ( Berberis vulgaris ) is the leading shrub of the same class. It is a surprise to most Bostonians to be told that it is an intruder. Beyond New England it is seldom seen, except as planted or as spontaneous in the neighborhood of dwellings, or near their former sites.

Privet, or piim ( Ligustruin vulgare ), is somewhat in the same case; but it has obtained its principal foothold in the sea-board portion of the Middle States.

The only trees which tend to naturalize themselves are one or two European willows, perhaps the Abele tree or white poplar, and the locust, the last a native of the United States farther south.

It would much exceed our limits to specify the principal trees and shrubs which, by being extensively planted for shade or ornament, have conspicuously supplemented our indigenous vegetation. Most of these are of comparatively recent introduction, and the number is still rapidly increasing. One of the earliest accessions of this kind must have been the English elm, — some trees of which, in the Boston Mall and elsewhere, may have been only a century younger than the celebrated American elm, which was until recently the pride of Boston Common. Perhaps the very first introduced trees were the white willow and the Lombardy poplar, both readily brought over in the form of cuttings, both of rapid growth, and more valued in the days of our great grandfathers than at present. The smallleaved variety or species of the European linden, or lime-tree, must also have been planted in colonial times. The horse-chestnut, the ailantus, the Norway maple, and the European larch are of more recent introduction. The earliest Norway spruces — not yet very old — were imported by Colonel Perkins, and planted upon the grounds around what was then his country residence at Brookline.

The common lilac and the snowball were planted in door-yards, where these for a long time were almost the only ornamental shrubs, as they still aie aiound New England farm-houses. Fruit trees were of more account, and in greater variety. But their consideration belongs rather to the chapter on horticulture. ^[4]By the Hon. Marshall P. Wilder, to appear in Vol. IV.

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Source

Winsor, Justin. The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts, 1630-1880, 4 vols. Boston : Ticknor, 1880-81.