NOTES ON SOUTH-WEST NORFOLK PLANTS 51 



to a similar cause. We may, indeed, owe all three plants to early 

 strains of seed potatoes. 



A friend of the late Dr. Balfs recently informed me that he 

 remembered how Ealfs on one occasion, noticing a well-known 

 Mediterranean plant in a cultivated field near Penzance, elicited 

 by enquiries that the stock of that very crop had been actually 

 brought from the Riviera. 



NOTES ON SOUTH-WEST NORFOLK PLANTS. 

 By F. C. Newton. 



The following notes I have collected during the last five or six 

 years while studying the flora of the district surrounding Walton, 

 which is the southern part of Watson's west division. The soil 

 is a chalky boulder clay, varying a great deal in consistency and 

 depth, frequently exposing or only covering by two or three 

 inches the underlying chalk. It is fairly well wooded, and in the 

 south passes into the peculiar "brecklands." There are several 

 commons and a good deal of almost undrained marshland. The 

 result is a rich and varied flora. 



Three plants called casual aliens in ed. 10 of the London 

 Catalogue occur, though Erigeron canadense can hardly be re- 

 garded as a casual now. The others are Sisymbrium pannonicum 

 and Melilotus indica ; neither have been before recorded for the 

 county. The Sisymbrium was brought from Gressenhall in 1911 

 by Mr. W. Watson, of Chislehurst, and the Melilotus I found at 

 Saham, and had sent me from Rockland All Saints. 



The woodland flora is not rich, and many common plants are 

 absent, for instance, Euphorbia amygdaloides. Paris quadrifolia 

 has disappeared from the area during the last twenty-five years. 

 The most interesting plants are : — 



Geum urbanum L. x rivale. Carex sylvatica Huds. 



Daphne Laureola L. Melica uniflora Retz. 



Aceras anthropophora Br. Poa nemoralis L. 



Habenaria virescens Druce. Osmunda regalis L. 



Aceras anthropophora occurs in a beech-pine wood in the 

 vicinity of Thetford, rather a surprising locality. The same wood 

 a few years ago contained Ophrys muscifera. 



The fen areas vary somewhat in type, but are fairly constant 

 in flora. Saham Fen is the only one I have noticed with a marked 

 convexity in surface. I am indebted to Captain C. J. Randolph for 

 permission to examine this fen, and to Lionel Robinson, Esq., of 

 Old Buckenham Hall, for allowing me to examine Old Buckenham 

 Fen, which is similar in type, as is Carbrooke Fen. All three are 

 waterlogged meadow-land, dominated in various parts by Ruscus, 

 Cladium Mariscus, and Schcemcs nigricans. In the wettest parts 

 of Old Buckenham Fen there are also large areas of Iris Pseud- 

 acorus and Carex paniculata. The following list contains all 



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