narrow valley on the southwest, and Tunis and Vly ponds near the mountain's base also feed the Beaver Kill. The Beaver Kill also, eventually, drains into the East Branch at East Branch, below the reservoir and thus outside of the city watershed. Graham's L-shaped summit ridge is narrow, with its spurs pointing northwest and southwest. The United States Geological Survey benchmark indicating the mountain's height of land is at the northwest end, near the ruins of the relay station. The southwest end descends gently to before dropping off more steeply into the Doubletop col. The north slopes and most of the summit are within a large tract of land purchased by George Jay Gould I, the son of Jay Gould, a native of nearby Roxbury. Known as Furlow Lodge, it still is owned by the Gould descendants and serves as a family retreat. The south slopes, up to almost on the summit ridge's southwest spur, are publicly owned Forest Preserve in the Big Indian-Beaverkill Range Wilderness Area. Flora and fauna Most of Graham's slopes, given their high base elevation, are covered in northern hardwood forest of beech, birch and maple. Unlike the other peaks in the range, first-growth forest begins well above , as high as on one slope. The summit itself is covered with a pygmy forest, unique in the Catskills, with its black cherry and mountain ashes barely taller than average human height. Balsam fir, which dominates the summits of both Doubletop and Balsam Lake mountains to either side of Graham, is found in small stands on the slopes below the summit of Graham. Catskill forest historian Michael Kudish has studied the range's balsam fir distribution patterns. There are no other peaks where balsam fir occurs on the slopes of the peak, but not the summit, and factors such as elevation, soil, and topography do not suffice to explain the phenomenon. He has concluded that all peaks represent different stages of forest evolution, in which the stunted and twisted ridge hardwoods gradually have replaced balsam fir over the last 8,500 years. The forests on the mountain support a typical animal community for the Catskills. Black bear and white-tailed deer are the larger mammal species, with many species of rodent, such as snowshoe hare, lower on the food chain. Beavers have been common over the years, with Kudish finding more evidence of present and past dams and meadows on