PHYTOLOGY. 



A BOTANICAL EEPOET ON THE LOGS OF KESCOBIE. 



By ABRAM STURROCK. 



MR G. DON, in his "Account of Native Plants of the 

 County of Forfar," pubhshed in Headrick's ' Survey of 

 Angus' (1813), says : "When the botanist traverses the marshes 

 and examines the lakes in the low-lying districts of the county, 

 he will find his trouble amply repaid." Botanists, since Don's 

 day, do not seem to have been of that opinion. Whether it be 

 that aquatic plants, or "water-weeds," as they are more gen- 

 erally called, are less attractive than their congeners on land, 

 or that they are less easily gathered, I venture to assert that 

 while there is scarcely an inch of ground but has been carefully 

 scanned by the keen eye of the botanist, the most of our Scottish 

 lochs, with all their wealth of floral treasure, still practically re- 

 main unexplored. That I am not far amiss in what I have 

 stated, the reader may be inclined to admit when I say that in 

 each of the only lochs that I have examined at all carefully, a 

 rare plant was discovered — viz., in Cluny Loch, Naias flexilis, 

 new to Britain ; and in Rescobie Loch a Batrachian Rajiimculus, 

 which I think may prove to be new to the British Islands. It 

 is in the hope that the botanical readers of ' The Scottish Natu- 

 ralist' may be tempted to " do " a loch on their own account that 

 I venture to lay before them the results of at least half-a-dozen 

 visits to the Loch of Rescobie. 



Rescobie Loch is situated in the valley of Strathmore, in the 

 parish of Rescobie, in the county of Forfar, and about three 

 miles east of the county town. It is the first of the two lochs 

 (Rescobie and Balgavies) on the Lunan Water, and is about two 

 miles distant from its source at the village of Lunanhead. It has 

 a length from east to west of a little over a mile, and a width of 

 about a quarter of a mile. The Caledonian Railway between 

 Perth and Aberdeen passes along the south side of the loch, and 

 crosses by an embankment over its south-eastern corner. The 



