iSS ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



The May issue of the " Journal of Botany " is of peculiar interest 

 to lovers of the British flora because of its containing an exceptional 

 number of papers of importance in their bearing on its study. 

 They are on " Three interesting Ascomycetes," by W. B. Grove, 

 B.A. ; " Forms of Potamogeton new to Britain," by Arthur 

 Bennett; "A Synopsis of the Orders, Genera, and Species of 

 Mycetozoa," by A. and G. Lister ; and on " British Roses of the 

 Mollis-Tomentosa Group," by Rev. Augustine Ley, M.A. 



New Records of Plants in South Aberdeenshipe. In Sep- 

 tember of 1906 we found the following plants, new to South 

 Aberdeen (v.c. 92), while collecting within a few miles of Aberdeen 



itself :- 



Ranunculus circinatns^ Sibth., at the Loch of Skene. 



Nasturtium palustre, DC., at Grandholm Mills on Donside, 

 where it had been known to a retired mill-worker, named Thompson, 

 for some years. 



Potentilla argentea, L., as a casual on the roadside at Balmoral. 



Scutellaria galericitlata, L., from the Loch of Park. 



We have also seen Euphorbia Cyparissias, L., specimen, which 

 had been growing as a garden weed at West Cults. A. C. MACRAE, 

 Macgregor Skene. 



Origin of the Blue Lupine (Lupinus nootkatensis, Bonn) as a 

 Denizen by the Dee. As mentioned in a note in this Journal, 

 (1900, p. 128), the earliest example of this Lupine known to me to 

 have been gathered in Scotland is a fragment in the Kew Herbarium, 

 bearing the label " L. polyphylhts, ? naturalised on the banks of the 

 Dee near Aboyne, August 1862," gathered by the Rev. M. J. 

 Berkeley. The Lupine forms so conspicuous a feature along the Dee, 

 for most of its course, and has produced so great effects on the 

 native vegetation, and even on the course of the river, that I have 

 sought to ascertain how and when it was introduced into the valley. 

 About a week ago a former student, Dr. Duncan Mackintosh, now 

 in medical practice at Aboyne, mentioned to me that he had been 

 told by an old man, who had been employed in the gardens at 

 Balmoral when Her Majesty, the late Queen Victoria, purchased the 

 old castle and estate as a residence, that the Lupine was one of the 

 first plants brought from the south, and had not been seen, at least 

 on upper Deeside, before, and that from the plants grown at Balmoral 

 seeds had been carried into the river, and had sprung up along the 

 river banks and spread by seeds quickly. As Balmoral was purchased 

 by Her Majesty in 1847, and was used as a residence at once, this 

 makes it probable that the Lupine was introduced before 1850, and 

 had sprung up from seeds carried down river as far as Aboyne before 

 1 86 1. It now looks as much at home on the more recently formed 

 shingles as any natives. TAMES W. H. TRAIL. 



