I902. Cook^-Trknch.— A the Holly dioecious ? 9 



sterile stamens are so large that the flower appears hermaph- 

 rodite. Truly hermaphrodite flowers sometimes occur." This 

 appears on the whole to be the most probable solution. The 

 following is the result of my own experiments : — 



While the trees were in blossom I enclosed about fifty 

 blossom-bearing twigs in gauze bags. The majority of these 

 I opened in August, when berries generally were full grown, 

 but not yet coloured. To my surprise I found them all to 

 contain berries to all appearance just like those outside. To 

 make sure, however, that these were fertile berries, I left the 

 bags on nine, and did not open these till November 9th. The 

 result was as follows — Nos. i, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. The berries 

 had become completel}' aborted, turned black and shrivelled 

 up. No. 7 had become loose at the tying, so that flies or 

 other small insects could enter, and here there was a crop of 

 w^ell-ripened berries scattered all along, but sparsely, there 

 being seldom more than one berry in an axil, and in only one 

 case were there three. No. 8 had a single berry ripened, all 

 the rest being aborted and shrivelled up. In the case of No. 

 9 I had noticed through the gauze that there were berries 

 inside, and therefore examined the bag very carefully before 

 removing it. I may safely say that it was as secure as any of 

 the bags which had effectuall}^ excluded fertilization. There 

 were within it four matured berries. They were all near one 

 another, and the bag kept well off them by the leaves. 



Nos. I to 7 clearly point to the Holly being dioecious. I 

 think the single berry on No. 8 may be disregarded as the 

 result of an accident. It lay very near to, if not touching, the 

 bag, and may possibly have become fertilized through it, or 

 it may have been en abnormally early blossom that got fer- 

 tilized before the bag went on. No. 9 with its four berries, 

 three of them close together, and the fourth about two and 

 a half inches from them, is more of a puzzle. Did some insect 

 get in through a hole that escaped my inspection, or did we 

 chance upon one of those hermaphrodite flowers that Willis 

 mentions as sometimes occurring? 



I hope to repeat the experiment next year, and communi- 

 cate the result to The Irish Naturalist. Will some of the 

 readers of this Journal join in the experiment ? 



MilHcent, Co. Kildare. 



A X 



