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TH E PLANT WORLD. 



with the papers. If kept in a cool, shady place, the plants will remain 

 fresh for a long time. The crown of one's hat may also serve in an 

 emergency. I have known of specimens that traveled more than 

 thirty miles in such a receptacle, and came out in good order. 



The use of the collecting press depends to some extent upon what 

 and how much is to be collected. For desultory collecting about 

 home, or for longer trips when a comparatively small number of spec- 

 imens are to be collected, the press is operated thus: It is first opened 

 and spread out flat. A sheet of the white paper is then laid on one 

 side and a plant placed upon it, then another sheet of paper and 

 another specimen and so on, paper and plants alternating until all 

 that have been gathered are formed into a compact pile (Fig 2). The 

 press is then closed over the pile and drawn together as tightly as pos- 

 sible by means of the straps. It may now be placed somewhere in the 

 shade, while other plants are being collected. Collectors who make 



several hundred specimens a 

 day, collecting twenty or more 

 specimens of each ' kind, fre- 

 quently place all of one kind 

 together without papers be- 

 tween, leaving the arrangement 

 on sheets to be done when the 

 plants are put into the drying 

 press; but this should never be 

 done except when plants are 

 ^^•^^ ^- abundant and there is not time 



or facility for collecting them otherwise. 



Plants, even when carefully collected and preserved, are abso- 

 lutely worthless without data. The collector of a limited number of 

 specimens should have time to write at least the date and locality upon 

 the collecting sheet as each specimen is put into the press. In collect- 

 ing many sheets of the same species a certain number may be given 

 to each species, and should be placed on every sheet collected. Each 

 species should be given a different number. It is the practice to be- 

 gin with I and number consecutively. If a plant which has been col- 

 lected is collected again later, it should be given a new number. 

 This number, together with all the data for the plant, is then set 

 down in a book kept for the purpose. The latter method saves 

 much writing in the field, the numbers on the sheets enabling 

 the collector to refer at once to the proper data for any plant when 

 desired. Too much stress cannot be laid upon the value of abundant 

 field notes. If every botanist would carry a note-book in which to 

 enter everything of interest about the plants, the study of them later 



