BOTANICAL EVALUATION OF THE GOAT ISLAND COMPLEX, NIAGARA FALLS, NEW YORK
P. M. Eckel
Buffalo Museum of Science
1020 Humboldt Pkwy
Buffalo, NY 14211 U.S.A.
www.buffalomuseumofscience.org

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POLLUTION
In a diagram indicating the prevailing winds at the Niagara Falls area (NREP, 1972), the location of sources of airborne pollutants was shown just upwind (to the north and east) of the reservation (Cyanamid complex, Ontario; the Buffalo, Tonawanda, Buffalo Avenue (Niagara Falls, New York) and Staufer Chemical complexes along the Niagara River). It is doubtful, then, that airborne pollutants from these industries have contributed significantly to deterioration of vegetation on Goat Island, other than regional effects in the Niagara Frontier Region which have not been documented to the present writer's knowledge.

Loss of some of the chemical-industrial base in the Niagara area, compliance with emission standards for the industries present and fuel regulations has probably had a positive effect on quantity of airborn pollutants. Since some plant groups are sensitive to air pollution, particularly sulphur dioxide, to some extent bryophytes, but especially lichens, which "are the first plants to disappear in cities" (Hale, 1967), there has probably been a small increased diversification and expansion of these communities in the study area.

If amelioration of air pollution regimes in the area continues, as it has "in the last ten years" (Otis, 1982), greater species diversity in populations of sensitive organisms will continue. Sulfur dioxide levels have been reduced, total suspended particulates, carbon monoxide levels and those of nitric oxide so toxic to evergreens, have been reduced (Otis, 1982, citing New York State Air Quality Report, 1980).

Water-borne pollution may be another matter. Pollutants built up in alluvium in the wet habitats of the west end of the First and Second Sisters which seem to contribute a special fragrance to the typical rank odor of this kind of soil. The present writer has found no negative effect on the vegetation that is related to pollutants: no apparent die-back, withering or monstrosities or effect on species diversity and abundance.

As already discussed, river water bears in it the material of dissolution and leaching of the surfaces over which it passes. It also carries in it waste matter of various kinds which seep or are dumped into it. Nutrients are constantly borne into proximity with the ecosystems in place in the island complex, enriching it, poisonous wastes come as well, but which effect could not be determined.

It should also be borne in mind that water pollution at the falls must have had a long history. The saw, grist, paper and pulp mills on the riverbanks in the nineteenth century doubtless all dumped their waste into the adjoining river.

As already mentioned, The spray from the cataracts is a constant occurrence at the falls. Recently (1988) there has been some controversy over water-borne contaminants becoming air-borne in the spray, with water pollutants being spread atmospherically within the area of the spray zone. Pollution of this type must have occurred from the time industry was established along the banks of the Niagara River, such as when pulp mill on Bath Island existed at the time of the establishment of the Reservation. Apparently no health hazard due to spray at the Falls exists since neither the American or Canadian governments has enacted protective measures there.

The limestone substrate acts as a buffer or neutralizer to acidic types of pollution, hence "the majority of lichens," for example, surviving on Goat Island, and which are as a group very intolerant of atmospheric acidity, particularly sulphuric acid, "grow directly on the lime rock, on or among mosses on rock" (Harris, attached report on lichens). As a native woodland in the midst of urban atmospheric conditions, so much exposed dolomite within the Niagara River Gorge and on Goat Island is a positive factor in the maintenance of native ecosystems.