Juue, 1900.] 135 



BOTANICAI. EXPLORATION IN 1899. 



BY R. 1,1,0 YD PRAKGKR, B.A., M.R.I. A. 



(Read before the Dublin Naturalists' Field Club, March 13, 1900.) 

 Owing partly to the si^lendid. weather of last summer, and 

 partly to the kindness of the Trustees of the National lyibrary 

 in allowing me an extended period of absence, I was able 

 during the season of 1899 to push on rapidly with the explora- 

 tion of the less known counties, and to add largely to the 

 records already accumulated for "Irish Topographical Botany." 

 About fifty days were spent in the field, and, though much of 

 the time had to be devoted to the compiling of lists of plants 

 (the necessary but hitherto neglected groundwork of local 

 ph3'togeography), the results were by no means devoid of interest, 

 as the following narrative will show. Owing to the length of 

 the season's work, it is possible only to refer to the various 

 excursions in the briefest possible terms. All picturesque 

 description and general considerations, of whatever interest, 

 have been of necessity cut out ; and the residue is little more 

 than an enumeration of plants which are either new to the 

 Districts or counties in which they were found, or which 

 possess some special importance. 



The season was a ver}' backward one. A preliminary two- 

 day tramp on May 13-14 from Edgeworthstown to Granard, 

 and thence down the bog-filled valley of the Inny into 

 MuUingar, yielded little of interest except Lachcca 7ii7iralis at 

 Knockdrin, where a glance at Mr. I^evinge's papers showed 

 me it was already known to exist. On May 28-29 ^ went 

 further afield, and, as the guest of Mrs. Frank Joj^ce at St. 

 Cleran's, S.E- Galway, I had the advantage of her guidance 

 over the interesting limestone country with which, to Irish 

 botanists, her name is associated. The first da}^, spent about 

 Moyode, yielded new stations for Neotinea intacta and Ophrys 

 vmscifera, and Viola stagriina was seen flowering in profusion 

 in the turlough from which Mrs. Joyce has already recorded it. 

 On the second day Knockmae, near Tuam, the most con- 

 spicuous hill in N.K. Galway, was visited, and Mrs. Joyce 

 made an important find in Epipactis violacea, previously 

 known in Ireland only from the Clare limestones and one station 



near Cong. 



4 



