BY THE SEASIDE— PLANT LIFE 



plants. The most simple method of increase is 

 known as vegetative reproduction, it does not occur 

 in every kind of seaweed and is nothing more or less 

 than the growth of a broken piece of plant into 

 a new individual. This form of increase is not un- 

 known higher in the plant world; begonia leaves 

 may be induced to send forth roots and grow into 

 new plants, many garden favourites are propagated 

 by means of cuttings and both these methods are 

 similar to the breaking away and growth of por- 

 tions of a seaweed; the garden plants, however, 

 are assisted by man, the seaweed does its own work. 

 The simplest forms of increase occur amongst 

 those giants of the sea, the Laminarias or Tangles 

 as they are often called. These brown seaweeds 

 often attain enormous sizes, they all grow below the 

 limits of low tide and appear to thrive best where 

 the water is frequently lashed by storms. To see 

 these plants at their best we must look down upon 

 them in their watery home. There are spots on the 

 North-Eastern coast of Ireland, where one may 

 look from the cliffs upon a veritable forest of 

 Tangles. There thrives the " Devil's Apron," short 

 of stem but with a flat ribbon of a frond, which 

 may attain a length of a dozen feet and a width of 

 as many inches. There too we can behold the 

 Fingered Tangle, with stem, maybe, six feet in 

 length and a crown of large finger-like fronds, '' Sea 

 Laces " or " Dead Men's Ropes," with fronds re- 

 sembling slender ropes, in length, at times as much 

 as forty feet, ride gracefully on the ever changing 



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