THE OTTAWA NATURALIST 



VOL. XXIX. MARCH, 1916 No. 12 



DATA ON SEED MATURITY OF SOME ONTARIO 



PLANTS. 



By W. Herriot, Galt, Ont. 



During the seasons from 1909 to 1914, the writer collected 

 extensively the seeds of many native and naturalized plants, 

 in. the vicinity of Gait, Ont., for the Seed Branch at Ottawa. 



While our standard works on botany usually give the 

 month of flowering of most plants, and many published lists 

 of local floras give exact dates of flowering, very little has been 

 published as to the time of the maturing of the seed. 



Having accumulated considerable data on this point, the 

 list published here may prove of some value; the dates given 

 for flowering are when the plants are well into bloom, and in 

 early flowering plants this may vary considerably in different 

 years, according to weather conditions in spring. The dates 

 given for seed maturing are when seed was collected, and where 

 plants ripen and shed their seed during a short period, as in 

 Claytonia, the dates can be taken to represent fairly well the 

 fruiting season. In some few instances where the seed is per- 

 sistent after maturity, as in Rumex, the date of collecting may 

 be some Httle time after maturity, and, therefore, not so accu- 

 rate. Again, the dates of flowering and of seed maturity in 

 many cases were not taken during the same year, but, as before 

 mentioned, except in early flowering species the time of flower- 

 ing from year to year is fairly constant: — ■ 



Time of Seed 



NAME Flowering Mature 



v'^PARGANiUM DivERSiFOLiuM Gracbncr Jul 15 Sep 23 



ScHEUCHZERiA PALUSTRis L Jun 8 Sep 4 



Sagittaria arifolia Nutt Jul 2 7 Sep 9 



Alisma Plantago-aquatica L Aug 14 Sep 7 



Andropogon scoparius Michx Aug 7 Sep 17 



