Greinar (Vísindafélag Íslendinga) - 01.01.1935, Side 71

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fully noticed, that the circlings are made in open spaces
amid the brushwood, and not in the open field. In the
Agrostis-slopes A. tenuis and A. canina are physiognom-
ieally predominant, but the latter preferably where
the soil is more barren. Of flowering plants there are
easily noticeable in many places Galium verum, which
often shows up as a yellow patch on the slope, Linum
catharticum and Trifolium repens. There are practically
no woody plants there. On the Elyna-slopes E. Bellardi
is most prominent besides several Graminæ species;
there are fewer flowering plants there than in the
Agrostis-formation, but there are rather more woody
plants, though nowhere so many as to have an appreci-
able effect on the physiognomy of the formation; the
principal woody plants are species of Salix and Thymus
serpyllum. The Elyna-slopes acquire nowhere the aspect
°f peatland, but have rather the peculiarities of grass-
land. There are no actual hillocks there, but on the
slopes there are oblong walls of hillocks which lie at
right-angles to the direction of the slope.
Among the gimssy slopes there are in many places
Wedge-shaped patches of snow, hollows over-grown
with flowers such as are described above in the brush-
wood. The species to be found are for the most part the
same as those described there, but I saw Rubus saxatilis
and Fragaria vesca outside the copsewood, though other-
wise Taraxaca and Hieracia are more numerous outside
the copse than in it. The boundaries between the dry
meadowland and the flowering land are in many places
very ill defined, and there are various stages between
them.
The top of the hill Húsafell and the tops of the slopes
are overgrown with patches of moss. The species Grim-
mia is predominant in physiognomy there, but the chief
phanerogams there are Carex rigida, Festuca ovina and
F- rubra. There are small lyme-grasses there too, but
they are not generally to be found in any number in
Skaftártunga.