DOUBTFULLY NATIVE WESTERNESS PLANTS 177 



In a mountainous country the distance a plant may be 

 away from cultivation has a different value from that which 

 it possesses in a more level district, mere mileage being of 

 comparatively little consequence, as some miles in a glen 

 may not make a place so " remote " as would a watershed 

 of a few hundred feet elevation, or a few indentations of a 

 rocky coast. 



In this district, as in similar parts of the Highlands, 

 there are some special circumstances to be considered in 

 forming an opinion as regards the claims of a plant to be 

 regarded as native. Some localities are to be suspected, 

 though often not obviously so, such as old sheep and cattle 

 shelters, natural or artificial, on both hill and low ground ; 

 stony sides of hill lochs, and the usually sedgy margins of low- 

 land lochs which cattle frequent ; the remains of old draining 

 operations, and other works often remote from present 

 dwellings ; sea cliffs below which there is grazing and 

 shelter for cattle ; sandy shores near old cultivation, and 

 shingly shores also, to some distance from present cultiva- 

 tion, the shingle giving better holding ground for rubbish- 

 heap weeds, which currents carry along near the shore ; 

 streams, and the shores of both lochs and sea near the outlet 

 of streams that have passed in any part of their course close 

 to houses or cultivation ; and remote localities to which 

 conifers " with soil attached " have been brought from 

 nurseries. The bare roots of hardwood trees seldom bring 

 introductions. In a thinly populated country an introduced 

 plant may be seen on roadsides at some distance from 

 houses, etc. ; but other specimens of the plant can generally 

 be traced along the road, or en adjacent bare spots, their 

 frequency increasing in proportion to the nearness of houses, 

 and around the houses and in their neighbourhood it will 

 sometimes be found in abundance. The agricultural and 

 economical history of the district as far back as possible 

 should also be known. The positions of old gardens, crofts, 

 summer sheilings, and cattle and sheep shelters should be 

 looked for. These last named are often on parts of the hills 

 at a distance from cultivation, and are not always easily 

 recognised ; but they not unfrequently give the clue that 

 explains the occurrence of some suspicious plant. The 



