BOX 51 



the upper ones more stalkless, and with an acid taste. The stipules or 

 leaflike organs are torn and silvery. 



The flowers are deciduous, in leafless panicles, drooping, branched. 

 The male flowers exceed the female. The flower-stalks equal the 

 sepals, which are without knob-like points on the midrib. They enclose 

 the seeds, which are yellowish-brown. The 3 sepals are ascending. 



Sheep's Sorrel is 18 in. in height. It flowers in May, June, and 

 July. The plant is perennial, reproduced by division of the roots. 



Like other Docks with a long stigma it is anemophilous, pollinated 

 by the wind. The early flowers are proterogynous, the later ones 

 homogamous. There are complete female flowers, or dioecious plants. 

 Sheep's Sorrel is, however, usually dioecious, the male flowers being 

 very small. 



The fruits are winged and wind-dispersed. 



This plant is essentially a sand-loving plant, growing on sand soil, 

 such as Marlstone, Glacial sands, &c. 



A cluster-cup fungus, Ustilago Knhneana, forms a rust on the 

 leaves. 



This Dock is a food plant of several insects, e.g. a beetle, Apion 

 hiimile, several Lepidoptera, Forrester Moth (Ino statices], Autumnal 

 Rustic (Noctiia glareosa], White -spotted Pinion (Gelechia diffinis}, 

 G. velocella, Nepticula acetoscc, Light - feathered Rustic (Agrotis 

 cinerea), and two Homoptera, Aphalara exilis, A. calthce. 



Acetosella, Linnaeus, is from the Latin, acetus, acid, sharp. 



The names in common use are Bread-and-cheese, Cuckoo's Meat, 

 Cuckoo's Sorrel, Sour Dccken, Lammie Sourocks, Sour Leek, Ranty 

 Tanty, Sheep's Sorrel, Sheep's Sourack, Sooracks, Soorocks or 

 Souracks. 



ESSENTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS: 



271. Riunex Acetosella, L. Stems many, leaves sagittate, tapered, 

 plant dioecious, sepals ascending, little enlarged, ovate. 



Box (Buxus sempervirens, L.) 



There is no trace of this rare upland shrub in any early deposits in 

 Great Britain. It is found from Belgium southward in Europe and in 

 N. Africa, N. and W. Asia, as far east as the W. Himalayas, in the 

 N. Temperate Zone. In Great Britain it is found only in four 

 counties Kent, Surrey, Bucks, Gloucs and elsewhere it is only 

 naturalized, being perhaps not indigenous in the last. 



The Box in its native state is confined to hills of chalk, or oolite, 



