100 The Irish Naturalist. October, 



above by westerly winds, and in any case so much interfered 

 with that the forest flora is now very poor ; above this, 

 we have in most places heavy peat, with its characteristic 

 and very limited vegetation. On cliffs and along streamlets 

 alone do we get any echo of the lovely alpine flora of Switzer- 

 land. As compared with Swiss conditions, our alpines have, 

 it would seem, a very bad time. There they get a gloriously 

 warm summer sun, and throughout the whole winter they 

 are safely tucked away under the snow, comfortably 

 dry and in a uniform temperature. With us they are, in 

 winter, mostly fully exposed to the elements and have to 

 endure incessant winds, soaking rain, and frequent ther- 

 mo metric changes. It seems no wonder that some of them 

 have sought a refuge at low levels, where they escape some 

 of the Irish weather. 



And that brings us to a very interesting point about 

 the Irish flora as compared with that of Switzerland, which 

 is this : the vSwiss alpines stick to the mountains, while 

 in Ireland many of them are found at low levels. Of course 

 the first part of this sentence does not apply strictly ; many 

 alpine plants are brought down, especially by streams, and 

 may be found in Switzerland at comparatively low levels. 

 But these occurrences are exceptional and temporary ; in 

 general the zone of the alpines is quite clearly defined. 

 In Ireland, if we take the " Highland Type " of Watson as 

 defining our alpine flora, we find that out of 34 representa- 

 tives in our island (Hawkweeds excluded) eleven descend 

 to sea-level, and eight more come down to 650 feet. Two- 

 thirds of our alpine flora, in other words, descends to 650 

 feet or less, while at the other end only 13 of the 34 ascend 

 above 2,600 feet. It s clear that were we classifying the 

 Irish flora de novo, we would not include in the alpine group 

 most of those Irish plants which in the Alps and other 

 mountain areas are exclusively alpine. This is a puzzle 

 of which no satisfactory solution has been found, nor have 

 I one to offer. The interest of this feature is heightened 

 by the fact, already mentioned, that some of the alpines 

 which in Ireland find their greatest abundance and luxuri- 

 ance at very low levels, are in the Alps quite typical high- 

 level species. The Mountain Avens and Bearberry are 



