PROCEEDINGS 
OF THE 
NATURAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION 
OF STATEN ISLAND, 
MoueVilT:- No. 12. 
The regular meeting of the Association 
was held at the residence of Mr. Fred. F 
Hunt, New Brighton. In the absence of the 
president Mr. J. Blake Hillyer was elected 
chairman pro fem. 
Mr Wm R. Hillyer, New Brighton, was 
elected an active member. 
Mr, Wm. T. Davis called attention to a 
movement, recently inaugurated by persons 
interested in plant life, designed to check 
and discourage the wholesale destruction to 
which vegetation in general is exposed by the 
wanton or thoughtless plucking and collecting 
of flowers and the breaking of shrubs and 
trees. New England botanists have formed 
a ‘‘Society for the Protection of Native Plants”’ 
and the New York Botanical Garden has 
recieved a ‘*Fund for the Protection of Native 
Plants,” the income from which isto be de- 
voted to three prizes of $50. $30, and $20, 
each, for the best essays upon the subject of 
the preservation of wild plants, including 
shrubs, herbs and trees 
Mr. Davis then read the following 
LOCAL NOTES ON VANISHING WILD FLOWERS, 
The State of Connecticut hasa law designed 
to protect its native flora, In the city of 
Boston there is a ‘‘Sociely for the Protection 
of Native Plants,” and lately the New York 
Botanical Garden has been presented with 
a fund, the interest of which is to be used for 
the same admirable purpose. The preservation 
of living plants in their native haunts has 
naturally received much attention in botanical 
journals, and the daily press has also done its 
part in serving notice upon the public, that 
they who ruthlessly pluck, dig up or 
burn the wild plants, are doing the commun- 
FEBRUARY 8th, 1902, 
ity an injury. Of course in every locality the 
conditions are somewhat different. The plant, 
that are in danger of extermination in one 
place may be abundant in another, For this 
reason Mrs. N. L, Britton, whose article on 
“Vanishing Wild Flowers,” published in 
Torreya in August last, has suggested that 
some notes ofa local character could be given 
for Staten Island , 
The chief destroyers of our local flora seem 
to be: 
Re shires. 
2. Agriculture, building operations, 
and the wood chopper. 
3. Cattle - 
4. Indiscriminate picking of flowers. 
The crowds of passengers on the Staten 
Island boats on Sundays and holidays in 
warm weather, bear away such enormous bo- 
quets, that the wonder grows that there are 
any flowers left alive except daisies andgolden 
rods, whose floral display can hardly be re- 
duced by the energy of even the most vigor- 
ous east side pic nic party. 
The fern Polypodium vulgare thoughcom- 
men enough northward, is rare on the Island | 
and is here a subject for protection. It once 
occured in considerable abundance on the top 
of a flat rock near Four Corners, buta num- 
ber of cows were turned into the wood and 
they speedily devoured the ferns along with 
much of the underbrush. The other stations 
for thisfern, at Silver Lake, etc,, have so often 
been burned over that it has been nearly 
exterminated The burning of our woods 
year after year, has also destroyed most of the 
patches of Club-mosses, and some of the spe- 
