RECENT DISCOVERIES IN THE SOUTH NORWEGIAN FLORA 243 



found in western Greenland. As a third and a fourth example in this connec- 

 tion, I want to mention the mountain species Pedicidaris flammea and 

 Arenaria humifusa. Both occur at present in northern Norway and northern 

 Sweden, but are rare. The nearest localities for Pedicidaris flammea are in 

 Iceland and Greenland; Arenaria humifusa has a single locality on Spits- 

 bergen but is not very rare in west Greenland and occurs frequently over 

 extensive areas in northern North America. It has never been found in east 

 Greenland, a fact which is of considerable interest (cf Nordhagen, 1935, 

 1954). 



In order to explain the occurrence of the Greenlandic-American element in 

 the mountain flora of Norway (and of Scandinavia), Blytt postulated a land- 

 bridge during the Quaternary time joining Greenland with western Norway 

 via Iceland and the Faeroes. This land-bridge should have been glaciated 

 only in part, and never throughout simultaneously, thus permitting dispersal 

 of plants in both directions. At present it is submerged but is often referred to 

 as the "Iceland-Faeroe ridge". 



In other respects, admittedly, Blytt was "skating on thin ice". He was wrong 

 at least in part in his uncritical characterization of the Scandinavian mountain 

 flora as emanating from Greenland and North America and not from 

 northern Siberia. If we include the Sub-Arctic flora from the northernmost 

 counties of Norway— a flora which is found also in the mountains — we will 

 find just as remarkable examples of disjunct distribution as those mentioned 

 above. One is represented by Oxytropis deflexa (Fig. 1), discovered in 1879 on 

 a low mountain at Masi in west Finnmark. Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish, and 

 Russian botanists have failed ever since to locate this species in any other 

 place in Europe. Its nearest locahties occur in Altai and along the River 

 Olenek in northeastern Siberia (cf. Hulten, 1950). Another species from 

 northern Norway worth mentioning because of its highly disjunct area is 

 Crepis multicaulis (Fig. 1). It was discovered as early as in 1851 in a single 

 locality on the south side of the Varanger Peninsula in east Finnmark. For 

 more than 100 years botanists from northern Europe have looked in vain for 

 it in other areas. Altai, Mongolia, and northeastern Siberia provide the 

 nearest localities (cf. Nordhagen 1935). 



I also want to draw the attention here to Scirpus pumilus (syn. S. alpinus, 

 S. emergens) (Fig. 2) with its highly paradoxical distribution area. In northern 

 Europe it was originally known only from the Eocambrian dolomite outcrop 

 at Porsanger Fjord in Finnmark where it was discovered in 1864. It grows here 

 both at sea level and on a low mountain with a rich flora (it was found by the 

 Xlllth International phyto-geographical excursion close to the top of the 

 dolomite mountain depicted on page 8 in the paper by Gjasrevoll, 1961). 

 In 1939 this species was found in the low-alpine region of a mountain at 

 Nordreisa in Troms Fylke and during the summer of 1961 in two locahties 

 on a small island in the Kvaenangen Fjord, about 40 km north of Nordreisa. 



