PAST, PRESENT, AND PDTURE OF THE AUSTRALIAN FLORA, 125> 



occurred in a greater or less degree, so that in all the settled 

 districts the Flora began to assume a mixed character. Nor 

 has this arisen solely from the introduction of esculent 

 plants adapted to the soil and climate. Many species have 

 found their Avay over the ocean and established themselves 

 in an accidental manner, or as following the steps of civilised 

 man. 



Wherever the land has been turned up the so-called couch 

 grass ( Cynodon dactylon Pers.) has taken the place of other 

 grasses, and from Port Jackson to the Blue Mountains it has 

 become very useful as fodder, though in gardens it is regarded 

 as a great nuisance. So also Brown's Faspabim litlorale 

 (referred to P. disticJmm, Linn.), which in the early daj& was; 

 limited to the sea coast, now flourishes on the cultivated 

 flats of our Eastern Rivers ; whilst Cyperus rotundiis (Linn.), 

 which in the days of Caley (1810) was known only in the 

 Government garden atParramatta, has become an intolerable 

 nuisance to many gardens in N.S. Wales. It is astonishing^ 

 to notice how various species of Rumex and Amarantus have 

 encroached on cultivated fields, and how in some instances 

 the native plants have been smothered by such Composites 

 as Wedelia hispida (Ktl.), Aster dumosus (Willd.), or different 

 species of Ccntaurea, Carduus Marionus (Linn.), Crypto- 

 stemma calendulaceum (R. Br.), and two species of Hypocluvris. 

 In alhiding to this subject the late Rev. J. E. Tenison- Woods, 

 F.L.kS. (a learned man of varied scientific attainments), 

 remarks : " The features of Australian Vegetation are also 

 being altered by introduced plants. Rubus ruhiginosus^ or 

 the SAveet Brier, has taken kindly to the arid Avestei-n table- 

 land, and covers the ground for miles with a dense thicket, 

 which it is difficult to eradicate. It is worse than either 

 the thistle or burr {Xanthium), The sweet brier is an 

 equally troublesome pest in Tasmania. On tlie east side of 

 the range, Verbena Bonariensis and Asclepias curassavica — 

 both garden plants from America — are troublesome weeds. 

 We have also an unexplained spread of an indigenous 

 tropical plant (-Su/a rlwmbifolia), which infests good soil to an 

 alarming extent. Every year also we have to chronicle the 

 spread of some common European weed which very easily 

 overcomes the native vegetation." In some places Lantana 

 Camara (Linn.), and in others several species of Opxintia are 

 detrimental to cultivation, whilst in gardens the ordinary 

 species of Eupliorbia, Stellaria, Ccrastium, Malva, and Sisym- 

 brium, spring up in great abundance. Contemporaneously,. 



