4i8 



The Ohio Naturalist. 



[Vol. Ill, No. 6, 



INTERESTING SPECIMENS OF SPECULARIA 



PERFOLIATA. 



EDO CivAASSEN. 



Peculiar specimens of this plant were found on sandy soil, 

 forming a thin layer on a horizontal sandstone at the Thompson 

 Ledges, Geauga County, O. They are very unlike those usually 

 found, their stems being often quite procumbent 20 to 100 mm. 

 long, wiry, thread-like and somewhat hair5^ The lower leaves 

 are rotmd, petioled and often opposite ; the upper are rotnidish or 

 oval, decurrent into the short petiole ; the uppermost sessile 

 roundish, cordate-clasping and alternate. All are more or less 

 crenate and ciliate-hairy ; flowers i to 3 in the axils of the leaves ; 

 calyx unequally 3-4 lobed ; corolla none or rudimentary (?); 

 capsules opening from below the middle into two uplifted valves ; 

 seeds lenticular. Some of the capsules furnished a few seeds, 

 which were sown several years later in a more fertile soil in order 

 to ascertain the shape and size of the plants when grown under 

 more favorable conditions. Only a single seed germinated, pro- 

 ducing a plant very different from those collected on the rock, 

 having a stronger and larger upright stem. During its growth 

 it was ascertained that, like those described above, it had the 

 lower leaves petioled, btit not (as Gray's and Britton & Brown's 

 Manuals say) all cordate-clasping. A number of measurements 

 of the leaves and their petioles were taken, which showed that 

 the six lower ones were petioled and the lowest two were almost 

 round, while the next four were oval or even .spatulate. 



The following table shows the measurements taken : 



8th and following ones not measured, all cordate-clasping and without petioles. 



