CHAPTER V
PLANT LIFE
Besides bacteria and unicellular algæ there are other forms of plant life in the Polar Regions. Various forms of seaweeds, both large and small, were taken by the Scotia naturalists when dredging in shallow Antarctic waters. In Spitsbergen waters and in the Barents Sea, off Novaya Zemlya and Franz Josef Land, the Scottish expeditions have dredged up great quantities of different kinds of seaweed, especially laminaria, and after a storm on the west coast of Prince Charles Foreland I have seen piles of laminaria and other seaweed fully 5 or 6 feet in height, heaped up above the ordinary high-water level. This seaweed ultimately rotted on the shore or was driven inland by the wind. There is one remarkable feature of polar shores; and it is that, except in a few very secluded nooks and crannies, no seaweed will be found between high- and low-water mark, nor in depths of less than a fathom or two below low-water mark.
On examining the rocks on which one would expect this seaweed to grow one finds that
88
