The principal objective of this paper is to present a comparison of the life-form spectra of the climax community as it occurs at the climatic margin of the deciduous forest formation with similar spectra obtained from the formation nearer its climatic optimum. This is done with Raunkiaer's thesis in mind, that there is a progressive change in the life-form spectrum as one moves away from warm, humid climates to colder or drier climates. He showed that, as the more severe climate is approached, life-form spectra based upon floras of different regions show an increasing emphasis on those species whose perennating buds lie near or within the ground (Raunkiaer, '34). His life-form classes are used here. The spectra are based upon the species of the climax community only. Data were obtained during August of 1946 and 1947 on ten hardwood forest stands near the University of Minnesota Biological Station at Itasca Park, Minnesota. The stands chosen are distributed over an area extending from Ponemah, on the Red Lakes Peninsula in Beltrami County seventy miles north of Itasca Park, to central Becker County thirty miles southwest of Itasca Park. To the west the area extends to the eastern edge of Norman County about fifty miles west of Itasca Park. Five stands occur at or near the prairie margin while the others lie well back from it. Although the latter are in a region mapped by Upham (1884) as conifer forest, they are actually within a broad tension zone between the northern conifers and the deciduous forest (fig. 1) (Buell and Gordon, '45). The limit drawn by Upham represents approximately the western boundary of this tension zone. In contrast, the transition between forest and prairie at this latitude is often exceedingly abrupt. Three of the stands are right next to such an abrupt margin, another lies in a forest peninsula extending into prairie, while the fifth is in the midst of the hardwood forest band. The objective in selecting stands was to find a relatively undisturbed representative hardwood forest along the prairie margin and in the hardwood-conifer tension zone. None of the stands found was without some minor human interference but those used represent about as satisfactory samples as can be found in the area.