The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-12-10
SAND DUNES OF CAPE COD
EXPORTS TO PRETENT THE SHIFT ING OF FAST SECTIONS or LAND.

Drifting Sands Trying to OVerwhelm
 Proviucetown--Wh the Harbor and
 Land Commissioners Are Doing-A Nur-
 sery of Life Saving Plants
 One of the most interesting of the
 many interesting problems awaiting solution at the hands of the harbor and
 land commissioners is that of the re-
 cldmation of the Province lands,
 tract of some three thousand acres ly-
 ing out on the extreme northerly point
 of Cape Cod, beyond Provincetown,
 and in fact beyond everything except
 the broad Atlantic. These lands were
 originally purchased from the Indians
 by the colony of New Plymouth, and
 came into the possession of the Pro-
 vince of Massachusetts Bay in 1892
 with the other lands of the Plymouth
 colony, the possession, of course, con-
 tinuing when the province became the
 commonwealth. The lands have been
 held by the state ever since, and are
 now under the care of the harbor and
 land commissioners. Besides the three
 thousand acres mentioned, there are
 about seven hundred lying along Pro-
 vincetown harbor, on part of which the
 town is built, the people there holding
 their titles through the harbor and land commissioners, while on the Pro- vince lands themselves, although there are a few squatters, no title can be ob- tained.
 The Province lands may be divided into two well-defined parts, the first a belt of heavily wooded land lying next
 to the harbor and the town of Pro- vincetown; the second, which is rather larger, an unbroken stretch of sand dunes and beach grass, reaching from
 the edge of the wooded belt out to the northward to the ocean. This belt of sand is continually moving along to the southWard, spreading out and covering in the vegetation as 1t is drfted in by
 the strong northerly gales of the fall
 and winter months, and the principal problem before the commissioners is
 the work of stopping this drifting. as there is no question that if the sand
 were allowed to advance in the future
 as it has in the past it would smother
 out the whole of the wooded belt and eventually cover he town and fill up
 the harbor. The evidence of the steady advance of the sand area is well de- fined and indisputable, and there Is It. tie doubt that the whole of this part of the Cape is thousands of years younger than the mainland of the continent,
 and has been formed by just this pro- cess.
 At the time of the sinking of the wells for the establishment of a water supply for the town stones worn smooth by the action of the water were found at a depth of twenty feet show ing that the beach had at one time been at this point two miles from the present line of the outer edge of the Cape. There is also no question that | the whole section was originally wood ed, just as is the inner belt next to the
 town at the present day. The latter is pure sand in its main formation, just as is the outer section, and the only tliLCLCiitt 10 tlldl lle lHteT DPlJ naS on
 top of the sand from three to four inch es of loam. formed by the woody mat ter from the plants and trees them selves, in which they can get a hold and defy the wind. All through the outer belt. where the sand has been cut away by the wind there may be found pieces of this loam, and also trunks and branches of dead trees, showing that it, too, was once covered with a strong growth How this growth got it's first start after the formation of the land is a question which it is hard to
 answer, but there is no question that 1t was there, and that it would be there still if it had not been for the cutting down of the trees and the removal of
 the sod by the townspeople, which gave the wind chance to cut in and sweep the sand back over it.
 To one unacquainted with this part
 of the country it would seem as if the work of keeping this sand in place should be a comparatively easy one, but a short talk with any of the Pro- vincetown folk will at once disab the mind of this idea. In a strong northeast gale, such as is common on the New England coast at any time in the fall, winter or spring, the sand on ! the outer edge of the Province lands
 drifts like snow and is infinitely more 1 feared by those who have to be out in l it. It is no uncommon thing for the | men of the life-saving patrol to have | their faces cut by it until they have the l appearance of raw beef, and the glass | in the windows of the stations has con- 1 tinually to be replaced, as the flying sand grinds it so that it is impossible to see through it. A couple of hours of l a strong gale will completely wipe out 1 everything which resembles a road in | the section, and a man crossing the sand dunes becomes lost in a few min utes, as the sand shuts out everything more than ten or twelve feet away, and | it is impossible to lift the head to look | to windward.
 In a place of this kind it may easily l be conceived that it is no easy matter l to make vegetation grow. and it is by vegetation that the harbor and land 1 commissioners propose to hold the shifting sands in place. and, in fact | they have already done so to a limited extent. This is the immediate problem | before them, and they propose to solve | it by planting beach grass and fibrous | plants on the exposed slopes of the sand, thereby breaking the hold of the wind and preventing the drifting | When this has been accomplished it is | the intention to supplement the work