104 



NOTE ON CALYPSO BOEEALIS, SALISB. 

 By J. BuBTT Davy. 



The "Botany of Califoruia" gives as tbe habitat and range 

 of this plant "in bogs * * * in the the mountains of 

 Mendocino Co., very rare {Miller, Vasey); more common in 

 Oregon and Colorado, thence through British America and 

 along the northern border of the Atlantic States." In 

 March, 1895, Miss Atterbury collected it at Cazadero, 

 SoDoma Co., Calif., and on March 14 and 15 last, I found 

 thirteen flowering specimens and several without blossom, in 

 the same locality. My specimens were not growing in hogs, 

 however, but on a well-drained hillside in the deep shade of 

 the virgin redwood forest; and in all but three cases they 

 were confined to the rich humus of decaying leaves of Se- 

 quoia. As far as I could ascertain, the few roots, abund- 

 antly clothed with root-hairs, did not penetrate the clay soil 

 beneath the shallow layer of redwood leaves, and in the 

 three cases where the plants grew directly out of clayey soil, 

 it might easily have been owing to the artificial scattering of 

 soil over them, as they were close to the side of the county- 

 road. 



In Bot Mag. LIV. t. 2763, Hooker says of Calypso " lip 

 large, pendent, ovato-oblong, remarkably concave, inflated, 

 slipper-shaped, pale reddish-brown, with dark dots placed in 

 lines; below, it terminates in two tooth-like points, and these 

 are, above, covered by a pale, almost whitish lamina, having a 

 tuft of yellow hairs at the base, and a few brown spots : it is 

 sometimes as long as, sometimes shorter than, the two teeth, 

 sometimes bifid at the point, at other times as in the present 

 specimens quite entire. * * * I have, on a former 

 occasion i stated it as my opinion, that the American and 

 European Calypsos should only be considered as one species, 

 and the present figures, drawn from living plants sent from 

 Montreal by Mr. Cleghorn, seem to confirm this opinion, 

 having the two teeth of the labellum as short, if not shorter 



1 Exotic Flora 12 t 12. 



