36 TYPES OF BRITISH PLANTS 
of the leaves the plant sends out a long shoot with a leaf- 
bud at the end. This forms fresh roots of its own, the 
shoot decays, and the new plant sends out fresh shoots, 
until the whole colony may entirely cover a pond. In the 
autumn it makes fresh leaf-buds, but these do not expand 
at once. They are loaded with starch grains and so on, 
THE FROG-BIT 
and drop to the bottom of the ditch or pond. During 
the winter they le quietly in the mud, but with the 
return of spring the cells expand and fill with air, and 
they float to the top to start work once more. 
The common Lesser Celandine works in both ways for 
the future. The bright, yellow spring flower, with its 
glossy dark green leaves, you know well, but perhaps 
you have not noticed the leaf-buds that form at the base 
of the leaves in autumn. When the old leaves wither 
