PAPERS READ 



NOTE ON THE PROBABLE OCCURRENCE OF ALDRO- 

 VANDA VESICULOSA IN N.S.W. 



By Baron Von Mueller, K.C.M.G., M.D., Ph.D., F.R.S. 



(Plate XVI.) 



In the year 1747 a highly remarkable aquatic plant was 

 discovered in Italy, and described by Monti, then Professor at 

 Bologna, namely, the Aldrovanda vesiculosa. Long afterwards 

 it was found in Bengal, then in the south of France, later in 

 Austria, south-western Russia and Prussia. Suddenly and 

 quite unexpectedly, in 1867, the plant was gathered in a swamp 

 near Rockhampton, Queensland, by the late Mr. P. O'Shanesy ; 

 thus it is but reasonable to suppose that it may yet be found in 

 many other places in Australia ; but it is apt to escape notice, 

 being usually entangled among other water-plants. Indeed I 

 found fragments of Aldrovanda among dried specimens of 

 Utricularia vulgaris, gathered in Silesia at the commencement 

 of the century, the collector never observing the prize which had 

 come within his reach. To draw prominently attention to this 

 most curious weed, a lithographic illustration is prepared now 

 for Australian use ; and the advice is given, when lakes, swamps 

 or river-bends are raked for floating or submerged plants, to 

 watch also for fragments of Aldrovanda. It seems shy in 

 flowering ; but the petals, when developed, are rather conspicuous 

 and white. At Calcutta the plant occurs also in *' salt pans ;" 

 but Dr. Roxburgh already found it there in fresh waters also, 

 alike to its ordinary occurrence elsewhere. Ripe fruits seem 

 seldom to have been obtained. The plant soon becomes rootless, 

 moving free about. The folded but vesicular- turgid, transparent 

 and irritable lamina of the leaves catches (and perhaps digests) 



