C. H. Ostenfeld: Contributions to West Australian Botany. I. 23 





by AscHERSON (1882, 30) 1 , the shoots break off in September and 

 October, and are thrown up on the shore by the waves. When 

 I collected C. antarctica in the pools on the coast of Yallingup 

 on Septh. 26th, I did not get the impression that the season for 

 their shedding had 

 begun, but perhaps 

 the time is not quite 

 fixed. When examin- 

 ing the material I dis- 

 covered remains of 

 the short basal parts 

 of the stems of the 

 assimilative shoots 

 shed last season ; their 

 dark, nearly black 

 colour distinguished 

 them clearly from the 

 light - coloured stems 

 of the present year- 

 shoots. The rhizomes 

 are very richly branch- 

 ed and, undoubtedly, 

 they last for a longer 

 time ; they were rooted 

 by many divaricate 

 much-branched roots, 

 (see Fig. 10). When 

 AscHERS0N(1882)stat- 

 es that, according to 

 Tepper, the rhizomes 

 do not propagate the 

 plant from year to 

 year ("Da ihre im 

 Boden liegenden Teile, 

 soweit Tepper beobachtete, niemals Knospen bilden, so würde die 

 Pflanze nicht auf anderem als auf sexuellem Wege sich fortpflanzen 

 können, wenn nicht" etc.), this observation is wrong. Evidently 

 the rhizome sends up new upright shoots each growing season, 

 just as the perennial rhizome-bearing pondweeds do. 



1 P. Ascherson: Die vegetative Vermehrung einer australischen Seegras- 

 art, der Cymodocea antarctica (Labill.) Endl. — Sitzber. Botan. Vereins 

 Prov. Brandenburg XXIV (1882) 28-33. 



Fig. 12. Cym. antarctica, from Carnarvon. An old 

 seedling grown from the "comb" and with creep- 

 ing rhizome and erect assimilative shoots. (About 

 V 2 nat. size.) 



