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BOTANICAL EVALUATION OF THE GOAT ISLAND COMPLEX, NIAGARA FALLS, NEW YORK |
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B. ISLANDS IN THE AMERICAN CHANNEL In the American channel are Luna Island, Crow Island immediately upriver from it, and Bird Island between Crow and Green Island (called Bath Island at the beginning of the Reservation), the last being the largest of this group (for a picture of Bird Island see section on the North Slope of Goat Island). Robinson and Chapin islands lie north of these, Brig and Ship Islands, are just upriver, or east, of Green Island. Ship Island was once joined to Green Island by a bridge. Other islets occur here as well (Porter, 1900). A tiny bit of land northeast of Chapin Island came to be called Avery's Rock (17 Ann Rep Comm, 1901), most likely to commemorate the tragic drowning of Joseph Avery, commemorated in a poem by William Dean Howells "about the day-long struggle and ultimate failure to rescue a man stranded on a log near the brink of the Falls" (Adamson, 1985). Other islands, probably the smallest ones, include Crow, Rock, Juniper and Salix Islands (1 Ann Rep Comm, 1885). In the present day, after water diversion has lowered the river levels at the brinks of the falls, the area of the original islands mentioned above has increased. Islands, or islets, separated from each other by small channels in 1883, have been joined together today, and numerous small bodies of land have appeared (compare adjoining maps). Ship and Brig Islands, once the only two above, or east of Green Island, are now joined by several more. It would be interesting to examine these new areas to see how they differ botanically from the central core, by what species are they being colonized, and what the patterns of succession may be. Calkin and Brett (1978) reported that "on Luna Island, a compact red sandy silt till up to 1 m thick lies directly on the glacially polished and striated bedrock surface." The till is a "compact, dark reddish-brown deposit with silty sand matrix and 10 to 18 percent rounded dolostone and red sandstone pebble clasts derived from the Grimsby Formation" (exposed upriver in the Niagara gorge from the Whirlpool, Tesmer, 1981). These soils may characterize those of others in the island group in the American channel, and may have been the condition of the contemporaneously exposed present shore on the Ontario and New York (Prospect Point) sides. These islands were, as the case with the Three Sisters, exposed by the Niagara River due to a lowering of the volume of water in the river in pre-European settlement times, subsequent to the event by which Goat Island and the inland shore of the mainland rose above water level (Kindle and Taylor, 1913). Consequently, both their native soils and their vegetation are younger than those of Goat Island or the mainland. The presence of much conifer growth on the islands in early reports and drawings may indicate the relative youth of their primeval vegetation. As the American channel only received around ten percent of the total volume of water in the Niagara River, there are no reports of serious erosion in the early Commission reports, such as from storm surges, as occurred in the Canadian channel (see section on the Three Sisters Islands). Ice would damage the bridges. Green and Luna Islands early received rip-rap dressings on their margins to prevent what erosion there was. Wied-Neuwied (1843) mentioned that portions of the islands in the channel of the falls "are covered with pines, some green, others in a decayed state ... the pines being frequently broken and snapped and here and there piled up in the water." In an illustration published in 1900 (16 Ann Rep Comm), the first bridge to Goat Island, built in 1817, is represented. There, either Ship or Brig Island is depicted as dense with Hemlock or White Pine, as is the shoreline of what might be Green Island or Goat Island (a cottage, is drawn at the "Goat Island" end of the bridge). The drawing appeared to Porter to be fanciful for Porter offered his own interpretation that the island "shown in the engraving [upriver from the bridge], if it ever existed, has long since been washed away" (16 Ann Rep Comm, 1900). Actually, the only gross inaccuracy may be the people on the land area in the bottom of the picture, and the perhaps artificial placement of Ship or Brig Island above the bridge. This first bridge to Goat Island stood upriver from Green Island. In depictions of the second and third bridges, the buildings at the Goat Island end are drawn as well. These bridges were built to cross Green Island (Porter, 16 Ann Rep Comm, 1900). Another picture illustrated the bridge (Lover's Bridge) to Ship Island. Here the evergreen trees are carefully drawn. Willow vegetation, such as is visible today, appears to be reduced, as are any other kind of tree, although shrubs are clearly drawn. A photograph included in the 20 Ann Rep Comm, 1904, showed Ship and Brig Islands and the northeast shore of Goat Island. The vegetation appears more complex than is usually drawn, with evergreens mixed with deciduous trees. Extensive evergreens are evident along the shore of Goat Island. In 1853, one visitor noted that behind the pavilion, or refreshment building on Green Island "a little wooden bridge led us to another small island [i.e. Ship Island], on which grow several writhing twisted cedars" (Kingston, 1956). Agassiz's scholarly group, on their way to Lake Superior (1850) noted that on Ship Island, that is, on "the little islet (only a few feet in extent) connected by a foot-bridge with the toll-house" on Green Island, Prof. Agassiz pointed out seven different kinds of trees, viz., arbor vitae, red cedar, hemlock, bass-wood, chestnut-oak, white pine and maple." Agassiz's remarks as quoted by one of his students above are interesting although one must explore the implications of such a rich arboreal flora confined to such a limited area ("a few feet in extent"). The habitat preferences of each species seem to be confounded on this little isle: dry-and wet-, open- and shade-preferring trees are growing together. This is not to suggest they could not in nature, but conditions for growth at the Falls were apparently unusually hospitable to have produced such a community. This arrangement, probably with the evergreens on the periphery, was would have been duplicated on the other islands. An analogous situation may be seen in the zoned herbaceous vegetation on the flats on the east side of the Second Sister Island. The Olmsted and Vaux plan of 1887, accepted by the Commissioners of the time, stated that "nothing would be gained by making these islands accessible that would compensate the injury which the bridges and the people who would be seen upon them and upon the islands would bring to the scenery" (Olmsted and Vaux, 1887). When the American Falls was dewatered in 1968, Dr. Alfred M. Beeton, an ecologist at the University of Wisconsin, was hired to evaluate the condition of the vegetation on the islands in the American channel, which would be left without water during the three or so months the bedrock was exposed. "The vegetation was watered periodically throughout the time the American Falls Channel was dry" (American Falls International Board, 1971). Dr. Beeton reported that these smaller islands supported populations of alder, birch, maple and elm. Alder is presently absent from the flora of the Goat Island complex, although it may be present in the islands above the American Falls. A copy of Dr. Beeton's report could not be located as of this writing. Access was not permitted to any unbridged island during the course of this study, and so the degree of alteration of the island vegetation could not be assessed. It should not, however, be assumed that these islands have not been altered. For one thing, their entire conifer populations have been lost for some reason, and so much of the arboreal vegetation now seen must be relatively recent. The island just upstream from Luna Island presently appears to have Cattail borders, white birches (Betula papyrifera), lots of young Sugar Maple (Acer saccharum), Equisetum, Dogwood (Cornus) borders, Willows (Black Willow, perhaps, unless the horticultural Crack or White Willows and hybrids), Ash, and perhaps young Cottonwood (Populus deltoides). These appear to be successional species and bear no resemblance to early testimonials as to their primitive plant communities. Another possibility is that the areas observed at the periphery of these islands are recently dewatered due to lowered water levels, and these are colonizing communities on the edge. However, increase in island area could not be assessed. It is unlikely, with so little water historically in the American channel, that much reduction in water level over the past century was tolerated. The diversion structure in the Grass-Island-Chippawa Pool upstream from Goat Island ensures a degree of natural volume in that channel. It does not appear that any new riverbed has been exposed on the north side of Goat Island due to any such dewatering. The American channel in 1969 was completely dewatered from June 12 to November 15 (The American Falls International Board, 1971). Several trees, mostly willows, died during this procedure (staff communication), and their dead branches are visible today. These islands are presently vegetated, the larger with wet emergent vegetation, such as Cattail, and perhaps infested with Purple Loosestrife and Flowering Rush. No conifers of any kind are visible. The character of the islands in the American channel with their grassy lawn or meadow appearance is in striking contrast to the densely shrubby Brother Island in the Canadian channel. Since access was not provided to these islands, the degree of disturbance or of preservation could not be determined for this report. There may be a population of Water Willow (Justicia americana), a native herb which is rare in western New York on the wet margins of one of the islands. |