837 



A NOTE ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE GIANT 

 CREEPER CALYCOPTERIS FLOBIBUNDA. 



BY 



. Professor V. N. Hate, B. Sc. 



(With a Plate.) 



The plant Calycopteris floribunda, also called Getonia floribunda is 

 fully described morphologically in all works on Bombay Flora. 

 But this morphological description will not assist us in understand- 

 ing the phenomenon of the dripping of water exhibited by the 

 plant, when a piece of the stem, nearly a foot in length and stout 

 as one's wrist, is cut off from the entire plant, to which attention 

 has been drawn by Mr. Wallace, C. E. 



In connection with this phenomenon a little consideration will tell 

 us that it resolves itself into two factors, namely, that there must 

 be a mechanism for readily absorbing and retaining large quanti- 

 ties of water in the body of the plant and that there must be 

 the means for preventing free evaporation or escape of water from 

 the body of the plant. To understand properly these two things 

 we must examine microscopically, the structural details of the plant 

 and study its surroundings. We shall consider the latter first. 

 This plant grows more or less upon rocky soils, exposed to great 

 heat, subject to great variations of temperature during 24 hours 

 and long periods of drought. In short the plant grows in such 

 conditions that it may be called a xerophyte. Now all xerophytes 

 show a definite response in their structure to their environment, 

 and thus we are led to examine closely the structural details of this 

 plant to make out any special adaptations, and we find we are not 

 disappointed in that. 



The stem has the general structure of a Dicotyledonous plant, 

 being monostelic and having open fibrovascular bundles. A 

 section of a very small twig examined microscopically shows a 

 closely packed arrangement of numerons fibrovascular bundles 

 with medullary rays reduced merely to radial lines. The 

 secondary formations of wood or xylem are very peculiar indeed. 

 They are almost formed of closely packed lignified wood-fibres or 

 prosenchymatous fibres with pitted walls (called Tracheids), 

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