$4 FLOWERS OF THE BOGS AND MARSHES 



up to 3500 ft. in the Highlands, as well as in Ireland and the Channel 

 Islands. 



The upland bogs are characterized in some parts by the prevalence 

 of Cotton Grass giving rise to a typical botanical association. Not 

 only does this one grow at high elevations, but also in more lowland 

 situations, and in marshes with sedges and orchids of a less special 

 nature. The waving tufts of cottony bristles, borne on long, slender, 

 drooping stems give this a peculiar habit of its own. 



The habit of the Narrow-leaved Cotton Grass is like that of the 

 others, sedge- or grass-like. There is a long, stout rootstock. The 

 stem is wiry, solid, rigid, bluntly 3-angled or nearly round in section, 

 stout, smooth, leafy, not tufted. The leaves are nearly all radical, and 

 variable a good deal in breadth, and are flat, and triangular above for 

 more than half the length, channelled below, smooth, linear. 



The flowers are in a cyme, with solitary (or more) heads. The 

 bracts are 2-3. The glumes are lead colour, egg-shaped, oblong, 

 lance-shaped, with a broad membranous margin. The fruit-stalks are 

 smooth. There are 4-12 spikelets, and the bristles are i to 2 in. long, 

 three or four times as long as the spikes. The nuts are inversely egg- 

 shaped, blunt-pointed. 



This Cotton Grass is 18 in. high. The flowers bloom in May 

 and June. The plant is perennial, propagated by division. 



The Cotton Grasses are all pollinated by the agency of the wind. 

 The flowers are perfect or bisexual. There are 3 stamens, and the 

 style is as long as the perianth, which is represented by the bristles, 

 and is not enlarged below, at length falling. There are 3 turned-back 

 stigmas. When pollination has taken place the perianth or bristles 

 get longer, and together form the cotton so characteristic of this group, 

 which, owing to the crowded flowers in this form, are very conspicuous 

 when full size. The nut is provided, moreover, with this light, silky 

 cotton, a fringe of hairs, as a means of dispersal by the wind. 



The Cotton Grass is a peat-loving plant requiring a peat soil, rarely 

 growing on clay soil, when it is a clay-loving plant. 



A beetle, Cryptocephalus biguttatus, Lepidoptera, Elachistcs clco- 

 chariella, E. rhynchosporiella, Marsh Ringlet, Coenonympha typhon, 

 Glyphipteryx haworthana, Haworth's Minor (Celana haworthii), are 

 found on it. 



Eriop/wrum, Theophrastus, is from the Greek erion, cotton, and 

 phero, I bear or carry, from the cottony heads, and angustifolium 

 (Latin) refers to the narrow leaves. 



It is called Cat's-tails, Sniddle Flock, Moor Grass. The second 



