19^4' Phillips. — Sonic Rare Plants in Ireland. 129 



NEW LOCALITIES FOR SOME RARE PLANTS IN 



IRELAND. 



BY R. A. PHILLIPS, M.R.I. A. 



The following notes refer to a few of the more interesting 

 plants met with during rambles through various parts of 

 the southern counties in recent years. 



Pyrus latifolia Syme. — This plant has not hitherto 

 been recorded as occurring in Ireland. In June, 1908, I 

 found it (two small trees) in an old hedgerow about two 

 miles south of Rosbercon, Co. Kilkenny, and later on, 

 another specimen on a rock close to New Ross, Co. Wexford. 

 In September, 1922, Mr. A. W. Stelfox and I, while visiting 

 the Piltown marshes, Co. Wexford, in search of Carex divisa, 

 which we found, discovered this Pyrus in abundance by 

 the Piltown creek, and, not having time to search further 

 ourselves, w^ere informed by a local inhabitant that it was 

 scattered through many hedges in the district. The 

 following day we discovered it in some quantity in a rocky 

 wood in Co. Carlo w near Graiguenamanagh. In 1923 I 

 found it again, a solitary small tree, on the bank of the 

 River Nore, about two miles above Kilkenny. 



In most of those localities it has all the appearance of 

 a native, flowering and fruiting freely. 



This tree was regarded as a hybrid (P. Aria and P. 

 torminalis) by some of the earlier continental botanists, 

 but Professor Henry, in a recent note, informs me that 

 " there is no doubt that it is a truly wild species." 



Pyrola minor L. — On June 29th, 1919, I met with a 

 large patch of this interesting plant flowering in a wood 

 adjoining an extensive bog near Mount Butler, Roscrea, 

 Co. Tipperary (North), and saw it there again (leaves only) 

 in March, 1924. The habitat is only a few yards, on the 

 Tipperary side, from the line of division between that 

 county and King's County. This is in all probability the 

 species recorded by How in his " Phytologia Britannica," 

 published 1650, as P. vulgaris Lob. " In a bogge by 

 Roscre in the King's County. Mr. Heaton." 



. The habitat was probably at that date part of the 

 bog from which it is now separated by the railway and a 



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