Michigan

The rivers of the entire State consist of numerous small streams of clear water. In the interior of the upper peninsula, along the east border of the lower peninsula south from Lake Huron, and in Saginaw valley, they are rather sluggish ; but many of the larger streams of the lower peninsula have sufficient fall to furnish a large amount of water-power, while the small streams that flow into Lake Superior from the central portion of the upper penin sula as well as some of the larger ones farther west, have several falls and rapids; in places also they are lined with steep, high banks. Most of the larger rivers of the State—the Muskegon, Grand, St. Joseph, Manistee and Kalamazoo—are in the west portion of the lower peninsula. Several thousand lakes of clear water, formed by glacial action, dot the surface of the State, and many of them are lined with picturesque woodland shores. Islands in lakes Superior, Michigan and Huron are scarcely less numerous.

Fauna and Flora.

Mammals include black bear, moose, deer, lynx, wolves, coyotes, wildcats, porcupine, fox, squirrels, hares, rabbits, musk rats, minks, weasels, skunks, racoons and woodchucks. The only woodland caribou now known in United States proper are found on Isle Royale. Among the game birds are quail ("Bob White"), grouse, including "partridges" (ruffed grouse), ducks, geese, coots, brant, woodcocks, snipe and plover, as well as the imported Chinese ring-necked pheasants. Of song birds the favourites are the robin, thrush, bobolink, oriole, chick adee, meadow-lark, cat-bird, blue-bird, wrens and warblers. Among fishes, white fish, wall-eyes, lake trout, perch, herring, sun-fish, bass, sturgeon, pike, chubs, suckers, mullets, sheepheads and Ger man carp abound in the lakes. The speckled, brown and rainbow trout thrive in many of the streams. The area now included in Michigan was a forest, except in the south-west, where there were a few small prairies, possibly cleared by the Indians. The re mainder of the south part of this area for about 6o m. along the southern boundary was a part of the great hardwood forest of the Ohio basin with woods varying with soil and drainage : on the drier gravel lands were oak forests consisting of red, black and white oak, hickory, ash, cherry, basswood and walnut ; in depres sions there were maple, elm, ash, beech, sycamore, poplar and willow ; and in the south-east there were a few chestnuts and tulip trees. North of this southern hardwood forest there were pine forests on the sandier land, mixed hardwoods and conifers on the loam and clay, and tamaracks and cedar in the swamps. The sandy

lands were in part burnt over by Indians, and there was a growth of scrub oak, aspens and huckleberry bushes. The tamarack and cedar swamps now have a growth, especially on their edges, of spruce, birch, balsam, white pine, soft maple, ash and aspens. In 1920 the woodland area, including stump lands, was estimated at nearly two-thirds of the entire State ; but of this area not more than 4,000,000 ac. now bear timber worth cutting. The State controls eight forest reserves, whose area is 356,388 ac., which are being re-forested at a rate of about io,000 ac. a year. White pine, Norway pine and Jack pine are the only species planted. Two national forest units, embracing about a million acres, were established in 1928.

Soil and Climate.

The soil of the south-west and south-east Michigan is for the most part a dark clay loam ; in the north cen tral part of the lower peninsula it is a light sandy loam, along the Huron shore it is heavy with blue clay, in the mining districts of the north-west the rocks are usually either barren or very thinly covered; and elsewhere in the State the soil is generally rich in a variety of mineral elements.

Although the temperature of the entire lower peninsula is con siderably influenced by the lakes, yet the prevailing winds being westerly, it is in the west portion of that peninsula that the moder ation is greatest, both the summer and winter isotherms being there deflected more than half the length of the peninsula. On the other hand, the prevailing winds of the upper peninsula being north-westerly, the lakes have little effect on the temperature there; and so, while in the south-west the extremes are not great, in the rest of the State they have ranged within two years from 108° to 48° below zero. Throughout the State July is invariably the warmest month, February the coldest ; the mean annual tempera ture is about 45°. The mean annual precipitation is not far from 31 in., a little more than one-half of which falls during the five growing months from May to October; the rain is evenly dis tributed over all parts of the State, but the snow is exceptionally heavy along the north shore of the upper peninsula.

Government.

The Constitution under which Michigan is now governed was first adopted in 185o, when it was felt that the powers which the first one, that of 1835, conferred upon the execu tive and the legislature were too wide. In 1908 it was revised.