1 6 FLOWERS OF THE WOODS AND COPSES 



Accustomed as we are to this plant in the garden we know its tall, 

 graceful habit, with large, drooping, blue flowers in a raceme or group, 

 and leafy stem below. In habit it resembles Meadow Rue, but differs 

 from it and all other flowers of the Buttercup group in many particulars. 



The inbent hollow bottom of the petal in the corolla gave it the 

 name Aquilegia, in allusion to the incurved talons of an eagle's claws. 

 Columbine, again, refers to the flower's shape, like a dove's nest. The 

 flat part of the petal of the flower is blunt and shorter than the 

 stamens. The five sepals are petaloid. There are five follicles, which 

 are erect, open above. The seeds are black and shining, minutely 

 granular. 



This plant is often 2 ft. high or even 3 ft. It is in flower from 

 May to July and is perennial. 



The five petals are large and conspicuous, each one hollowed 

 from the claw upwards, to form a hollow spur or horn-shaped cavity, 

 15-22 mm. long, with a cup-like mouth, admitting a humble bee's 

 head, and the narrow tubular part is curved inwards and dow r nwards 

 above, containing the honey secreted by a fleshy thickening in the 

 spur. Bees with a long proboscis hold on to the flower below, 

 clutching hold of the base of the spur with their fore legs, and with 

 their mid and hind legs they clasp the stamens and pistil, which project 

 obliquely downwards in the middle. They introduce the head into 

 the aperture of the spur where the outer wall touches the end of 

 the proboscis following the curve of the spur. In younger flowers the 

 hind part of the bee's body touches the anthers, closely surrounding 

 the carpels covered outside with pollen, and in older flowers the 

 same parts touch the carpels which have become elongate, and spread 

 the stigmas farther apart. So cross-pollination follows. 



The visitors are Bomtnis hortoriim, B. terrestris, B, agrorwn, 

 Halictus. B. terrestris cannot reach the honey and bites a hole at 

 the base of the spur in order to obtain it. Holes may frequently be 

 seen and are due to this cause. 



The Columbine is adapted to wind dispersal, the numerous seeds 

 being shaken out of the follicle, open above, when the latter is ripe. 



It is a rock plant, choosing a rock soil, which may be granitic, 

 schistose, or even a sand rock with some humus. 



SEcidium a^iilegitf is a cluster- cup fungus which lives on this 

 plant. The moths, Gray Chi, Polia c/n, Anistoma ulmaria, Small 

 Ranunculus, Hecatera dysodea, Pterophorns cosnwdactylus, the Homop- 

 teron, Hyalopteris trirhoda, and the fly, Phytomyza aquilegice, fre- 

 quent it. 



