NOTES ON BRISTOL PLANTS 



299 



NOTES ON BBISTOL PLANTS. 



By James W. White. 



I hear from Mr. H. S. Thompson, who is engaged on an ecological 

 and photographic survey of the extensive mud- and sand-flats between 

 Burnham-on-Sea and Brean Down, North Somerset, where a large 

 area of chancing coast at the mouth of the Barrett has recently 

 become more or iess covered with vegetation, that far out on the mud 

 seaward of Berrow there is much Salicomia dolichostachya Moss 

 (determination confirmed by Dr. E. J. Salisbury), which has not 

 hitherto been recorded for the county, though it is known in Devon 

 (Cambr. Brit. El. 1912). Marshall, too, got it at Dawlish in 1915. 

 8. dolichostachya is placed by Drs. Moss and Salisbury in the Cambr. 

 Brit. Fl. as the sole representative of their Dolichostachyae, and 

 Mr. Thompson says the description there given fits the Berrow speci- 

 mens excellently. ' He noticed some that consisted merely of a single 

 long spike of 8-12 cm. on an unbranched stem of similar height. 

 The seeds produced are quite large, up to 2 mm., covered with long 

 hairs. 



Although the mud-flat vegetation is entirely submerged at high 

 tide, Mr. Thompson met with some Glyceria maritima in flower on 

 July 9. The flowering had ceased by Aug. 23. 



Another most interesting fact reported by my friend is that 

 Spartina Townsendi has become well established on the Berrow 

 flats, two of the three clumps observed being about three yards in 

 extent. The probability is that these originated from detached roots 

 washed down Channel via Sand Point and Brean Down from the 

 foreshore below Clevedon, 15 miles N.N.E., where Spartina was 

 planted about the year 1913 (see Journ. Bot. 1918, p. 84). 



On August 27 Limosella aquatica L. was discovered by Messrs. 

 H. J. Gibbons and C. Alden on the mud of a dried-up duck-pond 

 some five miles N.E. of Bristol. The plant grows in fair quantity 

 amid a litter of sherds, old tin cans and kettles, and the feathers of 

 poultry, while the drainage of neighbouring cottages finds its way 

 alono- the margin. A spot less attractive to rambling botanists can 

 hardby be imagined, so there may be some excuse for those of the 

 last generation who passed by the place unheedingly year after year. 

 Save for a locality in the Forest of Dean, this appears to be the first 

 authentic record for West Gloucester ; and the species is new to the 

 Bristol district. 



The dry summer has favoured Gyperus fuscus in the Walton 

 valley. This is a plant that thrives and blossoms in perfection only 

 when the season is precisely to its liking : in other years it remains 

 dormant and makes no sign. Moisture it must have, of course, but 

 not too much. As a result of the late drought water in the broad 

 peat ditches had become reduced to a depth of about two inches, and 

 in this at the middle of August the sedge appeared in such profusion 

 that a dozen tufts could be taken from a square yard of ditch bottom. 

 This display, however, was speedily ended, for with the first rains, a 

 fortnight later, the water rose and submerged it all. And before 

 winter sets in these ditches will have been trimmed and raked out by 

 the farmers' men. 



