CLEY BEACH
237
   Along the eastern half of the Marams the Suaeda bushes run in three distinct zones (Plate XXVI):—
(1)	A marginal zone along the lee fringe of the beach;
      (2)	An intermediate zone; and
      (3)	An upper zone.
The marginal zone is the one most recently established; it is continually increasing by invasion. It probably dates from 1897, the year of the last very great tidal inundation. Prior to that year the present intermediate zone probably occupied the marginal position, whilst the upper zone dates back to a much earlier period. On this view the two bare intervals of shingle between the zones of bushes correspond to advances of the shingle—the lower one to the tide of 1897, the upper to some previous unascertained date. The general relations of the Suaeda bushes to beach travel have already been fully illustrated and described at pp. 106-110.
   It has frequently been stated that the lee fringe is the region of establishment of Suaeda bushes, and this is probably true as to 99 per cent of such cases. Occasional seedlings, however, can and do germinate and establish in other positions— even on the crest itself. Between the Watch House and the end of the road from Cley (a distance of if miles) fifty such seedlings have been detected, and there is little doubt this number would be indefinitely increased did natural processes continually operate in distributing broadcast the seed and the drift.
   The Cley Beach Section.—Continuing east from the Marams the beach becomes bare and very mobile, the crest is uneven and liable to be overrun by the highest tides. Whenever big seas and big tides come together it is Cley Beach that suffers first, and much shingle is transported to the lee fringe, where it is shot into the channel. It is within the memory of by no means the oldest inhabitants that there was formerly a considerable strip of saltings between the beach and the channel— perhaps 50 feet wide. This has long disappeared through the landward travel of the beach, and now every ton of shingle washed over finds its way direct into the bed of the channel,