146 FLOWERS OF ROCKS, WALLS, ETC. 



The seeds of Sand Spurrey are dispersed by its own agency. 

 The capsule is split into valves, and the seeds are scattered when ripe 

 close to the plant; but they may be wind -scattered, the bordered 

 margin facilitating this. 



The plant is saxicolous or a rock plant, and requires a rock soil, 

 growing on volcanic, igneous, and granite rocks which are more or less 

 barren. 



The fungus Uromyces sparsus infests it. 



From the general similarity between it and Spurrey the Latin name 

 is a diminutive of Spergula, and rubra, red, refers to the flowers. 



This is one of those plants that serve to make up a floral index, 

 flowering only at certain hours of the day. 



ESSENTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS: 



59. Spergularia rubra, Pers. Stem branched, prostrate, leaves 

 linear, flat, with a bristle, stipules triangular, chaffy, flowers purple, 

 capsule not exceeding the calyx, shorter than the pedicels, seeds not 

 winged. 



Bird's-foot (Ornithopus perpusillus, L.) 



Nothing is known of the distribution of this plant except from its 

 distribution to-day in the Northern Temperate Zone in Europe and 

 North Africa. In Great Britain it is absent from Radnor, Carmarthen, 

 Montgomery, Merioneth, Northumberland, Cheviotland, Renfrew, 

 occurring in the East Lowlands only in Edinburgh, not in Kincardine 

 or Aberdeen or Easterness in the E. Highlands, and elsewhere only in 

 I )umbarton. From Moray and Dumbarton it ranges, however, to the 

 extreme south elsewhere. It is very rare only in S.E. Ireland. It 

 occurs in the Channel Islands. 



Bird's-foot is found on bare sandy or gravelly places, which may 

 form parts of mountainous or hilly districts, or the lowlands, or parts of 

 heaths or commons, where it is most frequent along the side of wide 

 alluvial river valleys. But it may also be found on stony ground in 

 wooded tracts, and also on walls and rocks generally. 



The stems are numerous, prostrate, simple, downy, with leaves with 

 lobes each side of a common stalk, the radical leaves prostrate, from 

 612, with a terminal larger leaflet. 



The flowers are white with red veins, in a capitate head, on short 

 flower-stalks, the calyx tubular, hairy, with 5 teeth. The pods are 

 jointed, with curved valves, and the first name is given in allusion 

 to the resemblance of the clustered pods to a bird's foot, hence the 

 English and generic names. 



