INTRODUCED PLANTS FOUND IN THE VICINITY 

 OF A WOOL-SCOURING ESTABLISHMENT. 



BY WILLIAM P. ALCOTT. 



AMONG agencies which affect the distribution of vege- 

 table life, sheep are an important factor. Brushing 

 amidst low vegetation, their fleece lays hold of all seeds 

 and seed vessels which are not perfectly smooth. These 

 seeds, becoming tangled among the filaments and often 

 working their way deep into the fleece, may be carried 

 wherever sheep are introduced or wool is manufactured 

 into cloth. 



We occasionally receive into our mills, wool from 

 Australia, the Cape of Good Hope, Asia Minor, Spain 

 and other countries of the Old World, as well as from 

 various parts of South America and from some of the 

 islands of the Pacific. Our New England factories draw 

 their supplies, in considerable part, from the states of the 

 interior, from the territories west of the Mississippi, and 

 from the Pacific coast ; and American flocks are contin- 

 ually maintained and improved by importations from the 

 other great sheep-raising countries of the world. All 

 this involves the scattering of seeds from every region 

 where sheep flourish. It may be expected that many of 

 the plants which grow where these animals can live upon 

 other continents, will grow where they can live upon our 

 own continent. Some perhaps may enter our milder sec- 

 tions, by way of the cooler, and some the cooler, by 

 way of the milder, while others may be unable to adapt 

 themselves to more than a very limited portion of our 

 national domain. 



Of these suggestions, the following list is an illustration : 



(162) 



